


In Love With A Bad Idea

by Dytallix_B



Category: Flight of the Conchords (TV)
Genre: Angst, Humor, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-20
Updated: 2013-07-20
Packaged: 2017-12-20 19:33:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 23,980
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/891024
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dytallix_B/pseuds/Dytallix_B
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bret is upset and Jemaine tries to figure out the best way to help him, which leads to some unexpected feelings...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Posted years ago under a different pen name. Just got an AO3 account so I'm moving my fic.

You got egg on my shoe," Bret remarked as he and Jemaine set their bags of groceries on the kitchen table.

"Sorry," Jemaine mumbled insincerely, looking down at his own soiled shoes.

"S'ok, I guess, should wash off," Bret shrugged as they both began unloading the bags and putting away the food, "we'll have to go get more eggs later, though."

"Well we do still have the one," Jemaine pointed out, holding up the lone egg he had managed to salvage from the original dozen.

Bret smiled, took the egg from Jemaine and put it in the fridge, thinking that it looked lonely sitting in the plastic egg holder all by itself. "You know, I think it was almost worth losing most of the eggs to see the look on your face as you tried to catch them," Bret said, chuckling a little as he recalled the scene in the elevator from a few minutes earlier.

They had been riding the slow lift up to their apartment when Jemaine had noticed something leaking from the egg carton and opened it up to have a look. One of the eggs was cracked and, as he grumbled about the fact that they paid for 12 eggs but would now only be able to use 11, the carton slipped out of his grasp causing all of the eggs to fly out. Jemaine had made a frantic attempt to catch them (looking a bit like he was trying to juggle - much to Bret's amusement), but, despite his efforts, all of the eggs but one wound up smashing on the floor of the elevator leaving a huge mess.

"Well, I'm glad you thought it was funny," Jemaine said, sarcastically as they put the last of the groceries away.

"It was," Bret confirmed, gleefully. "You'd better hurry and clean that up though, man, Eugene'll be pissed if he sees it."

"Yeah, I know," Jemaine agreed, and grabbed a roll of paper towel, a wet cloth, and an empty plastic bag.

"I'm going to check the answerphone messages," Bret announced as Jemaine prepared to leave. 

Jemaine briefly heard the sound of Bret's mum's voice on the machine as he shut the door and made his way over to the elevator. He pressed the button and, after a minute, the doors opened. Jemaine breathed a sigh of relief that nobody was in there, and stepped in, shells crunching under his shoes. He grimaced as he set about the task of cleaning the snotty, slimy remains of 11 eggs off of the floor and walls of the elevator. 

Once he was finished, he gathered up the bag of soiled paper towels and eggshells and made his way back to the apartment. 

Jemaine kicked off his eggy shoes once he was in the door and went to the trash can to toss out the mess. 

"You carry the eggs next time, Bret," Jemaine suggested as he washed his hands at the kitchen sink, "I don't want to risk having to clean something like that up again. Euch." He shuddered.

Jemaine opened the fridge then the cupboards and scoped out all of the newly available food. "What do you want to have for dinner tonight, Bret?" he asked. "We could make a pizza...or, ooh...what about spaghetti? Bret! Bret...?"

When he didn't get an answer, Jemaine turned to look towards the couch where Bret had been sitting since Jemaine came in and was taken aback when he saw that Bret was staring straight ahead with silent tears rolling down his cheeks.

Jemaine forgot all about dinner and stared, dumbly, at Bret for a few moments. Bret had been fine, even laughing about Jemaine's misfortune with the eggs not one minute before Jemaine had left to clean the elevator. He couldn't have been gone for more than 10 minutes. What could have possibly happened in that short a period of time to make Bret this upset?

Jemaine wracked his brain but came up with nothing. He opened his mouth to say something to Bret but quickly closed it again, not having a clue what to say and not wanting to embarrass Bret by acknowledging the tears. After all, maybe Bret wanted to be left alone.

Jemaine gingerly made his way across the room, walking behind the couch and ended up sitting down in the armchair, trying to seem nonchalant. Part of Jemaine really wanted to say something to Bret, but he figured it was best to just ignore it for now, and hope Bret would pull himself together on his own. Then they could make dinner, and maybe practice a bit, and forget this whole thing even happened.

Jemaine sighed and looked away from Bret. Looked at the floor. Looked to the window. Absently drummed his fingers on the arm of the chair. At times like this he wished their apartment was bigger, as there really wasn't any way he could give Bret his privacy. Unless he wanted to hole up in the bathroom, but that seemed a bit silly.

Jemaine looked quickly over at Bret again, hoping maybe he had stopped crying in the 30 seconds or so since Jemaine had last checked, but no such luck. Bret's eyes were squeezed shut, he was sniffling, and it was obvious to Jemaine that Bret was fighting a losing battle. 

Jemaine sat there, chewing his lower lip absently, feeling both useless and a bit uncomfortable. It wasn't as though Jemaine had never seen Bret cry before. Hardly. Bret was an extremely sensitive person, probably the most sensitive man that Jemaine had ever met, and he did cry rather easily, but he also tended to get over whatever was bothering him quite quickly and Jemaine rarely had to do much aside from the occasional "there, there" or talking appliance routine. Bret also tended to have an obvious reason for crying, which made it much easier for Jemaine to determine what course of action he should be taking, if any. If they were watching a sad movie, Jemaine was likely crying along with Bret and they would both just ignore it, if Bret had been dumped by a girl, Jemaine would make him a cup of tea, or write a silly song about her to list all of the reasons why Bret was better off without her (the lyrics mostly consisting of made up things that grew more and more outlandish until he finally had Bret laughing), if Bret was missing home, Jemaine would put on an episode of The Dog Show, or build a bivouac, or, if nothing else he tried was working, he'd make up some reason why Bret should call his mum...

It suddenly dawned on Jemaine that Bret had been checking a message from his mum as Jemaine was leaving the apartment. His heart sank - what if she had been calling with bad news? Jemaine hoped that nobody was dead or anything, though, judging by how upset Bret was, whatever it was couldn't be good.

Jemaine looked over at Bret again, who was now hiccuping miserably, tears still falling, and came to the conclusion that he couldn't just ignore this and wait for Bret to pull himself together. Jemaine was going to have to do something to try to help Bret. It wasn't that Jemaine didn't WANT to comfort Bret, quite the contrary, it broke his heart to see Bret so upset, but Jemaine had a tendency to say stupid things in serious situations and just made things worse a lot of the time. 

After thinking about it for a minute, Jemaine figured he should start by offering Bret a tissue. That would be a good, friendly, comforting, non-stupid thing to do, right?

Jemaine stood up and looked around the room. They never bought proper tissue, and he had used the last of the paper towels cleaning up the egg mess, so toilet paper would have to do. Jemaine made his way behind the couch again and retrieved a roll of toilet paper from the bathroom. 

He stood in front of Bret who had his head down and held out the roll, hoping Bret would take it. Jemaine cleared his throat after a minute, then took some paper off the roll to hand to Bret.

"Bret...?" Jemaine began quietly, "I...um...I couldn't help but notice that you're crying...kind of a lot...so...I brought you some tissue." He tried to sound as upbeat as possible.

Bret made no move to take the tissue from Jemaine's outstretched hand. Jemaine wasn't even sure if Bret was aware of his presence.

After another few moments of standing there, dumbly, Jemaine set the roll down on the table next to Bret, "I'll just put it here...in case you want some later." Jemaine said. "It's just...on the table..." he trailed off.

OK, now what? Bret was still crying and Jemaine was still no closer to knowing why or how to stop it. 

Jemaine screwed up his courage and moved to sit gently on the couch next to Bret. Bret still didn't look at him.

"So...um...you're crying..." Jemaine stated lamely, "uh...yeah, you probably know that..." Jemaine cringed, he was so bad at this. Why was he so bad at this? This was Bret, his best friend, he should know better what to do. He tried something else, "Do you need me to get you anything?" he asked.

Bret shook his head almost imperceptibly. Jemaine took this as a good sign, at least they were communicating. Plus, he thought absently, Bret had obviously heard him, so he could cross "sudden deafness" off the list of possible reasons for Bret's tears.

"Do you want me to make you some tea?" Jemaine offered.

Bret shook his head, no.

"D'you want me to leave?" Jemaine asked.

Bret shook his head again.

Jemaine figured he should probably get to the point. If he just kept asking yes or no questions they could be here all night. He didn't want Bret to dehydrate or anything, then he'd have two problems on his hands.

"What's wrong, Bret?" Jemaine asked, quietly.

Bret just shook his head in response and continued to cry. 

"Come on," Jemaine coaxed, "you can tell me."

Bret shook his head again.

"Bret," Jemaine said, "you can't keep this up all night, you need to talk sometime."

Bret said nothing.

"Maybe you'd feel better if you just told me what was wrong?" Jemaine suggested - knowing HE would certainly feel better. This was much more difficult than he thought it would be. 

After a few moments of heavy silence, Bret took a deep, shuddering breath and opened his mouth to speak.

"It's...it's..." Bret began, but couldn't continue and put his face in his hands.

"Aw, Bret," Jemaine was at a loss, "it can't be all that bad, can it?"

Bret just nodded.

"Did something happen?" Jemaine asked, "Does this have to do with the message from your mum?"

Bret nodded again, not looking up.

"What is it?" Jemaine asked again.

Bret didn't answer.

"Come on now," Jemaine coaxed some more, and gently reached for Bret's hands to pull them away from his face.

"It's Maisie!" Bret blurted out, finally looking at Jemaine, "She...she was hit by a car!"

And with that, the floodgates opened and Bret began to sob wretchedly. Not knowing what else to do, Jemaine put an arm awkwardly around Bret's shoulders. At this, Bret practically launched himself at Jemaine, burying his face in his chest and clutching desperately at the front of his shirt.

Jemaine was a bit startled, he really hadn't expected this. He had mistakenly thought that Bret would have begun to pull himself together after spilling what was bothering him. But after a moment, Jemaine did the only thing he could think to do and brought his other arm around to give Bret a proper hug. 

Poor Bret, Jemaine thought as he held his friend. Bret had gotten the dog, a scrappy little mutt, when he was in his late teens - found her as a puppy on the side of the road - and Bret loved her to death. She had continued living with his parents after Bret left home, but she was always overjoyed to see Bret whenever he went home to visit. Even though Bret didn't talk about her a lot, Jemaine knew Bret had been missing Maisie quite a bit since they had come to America, and that he sometimes worried she was forgetting him. But now she was gone and Bret never got a chance to say goodbye. 

Jemaine couldn't remember ever hearing anything more heartbreaking than the sound of Bret's muffled sobs. He felt a rush of love for his friend that surprised him a little in its intensity. He patted Bret's back and held him tighter. "I'm so sorry, Bret," he offered, "she had a good life though, right? I mean, she was pretty old...and...and at least she's not suffering...anymore?" he added, lamely, immediately realizing he had probably said entirely the wrong thing.

Bret finally lifted his head from Jemaine's chest and looked up at him, a puzzled expression on his face, "I didn't say she was dead." Bret said, sounding slightly appalled.

"Oh," Jemaine said, and they broke apart from the hug, still sitting quite close, "well that's great! I just thought...you know...with..." he gestured to Bret's face, "that it was...no, that's great!"

"She was hit by a car though, Jemaine!" Bret countered, angrily, "Mum says she's in surgery right now!" fresh tears springing up in his eyes.

"OK, calm down. It's going to be alright, Bret," Jemaine said, putting his hands firmly on Bret's shoulders, "listen, you have to stop crying, mate, you're just getting yourself all worked up." 

"Sorry..." Bret mumbled, sniffing mightily.

"It's OK," Jemaine assured him, gently, "do they think she's going to...you know...pull through...?"

"Mum thinks so," Bret said, "luckily the car that hit her wasn't moving very fast, but they need to fix a bone in her leg..."

"That's it...?" Jemaine blurted out, realizing too late that it was probably a bit insensitive but not particularly caring, "that doesn't sound too bad...so what's with all this?" he brushed a tear from Bret's face and smiled what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

"Well, I'm not there with her, am I?" Bret answered, voice raised, "I'm sure she thinks I abandoned her already but now that I'm not there when she needs me the most she probably thinks I hate her!" he wailed, a few tears spilling over again.

"Hey!" Jemaine said, cupping Bret's face in his hands, "hey, hey, hey...none of that. I'm sure she doesn't think you hate her - that dog adores you!"

"I dunno..." Bret said, miserably, still crying despite all of Jemaine's efforts to get him to stop.

"Bret..." Jemaine pleaded, voice a mixture of frustration and sadness, "please don't cry."

"Can't...can't...help it..." Bret hiccuped.

Nothing was working, Jemaine thought, how could nothing be working? He looked at Bret's face, a picture of misery, and decided that this called for desperate measures. He couldn't stand to see Bret this upset for even one more second. Without fully thinking through what he was about to do, Jemaine brought his lips to Bret's and kissed him, briefly, but soundly.

He moved away from the kiss and searched Bret's face for a reaction.

Bret immediately stopped crying. So that was a plus. But he now had an intensely puzzled look on his face, which was perhaps not so fantastic. Jemaine's heart sank. Yet again, he had done completely the wrong thing and ruined everything.

"Um...uh..." Jemaine stammered, averting his eyes from Bret's which were currently the size of saucers, "...sorry..." he mumbled.

"You...you...kissed me..." Bret said. It almost sounded like a question.

"Um...yes..." Jemaine confirmed, sheepishly, "guess I...probably shouldn't have done that..." he trailed off.

"Why did you...?" Bret asked. He didn't look angry, just confused.

"Dunno actually..." Jemaine answered truthfully, "you just...you just looked so sad, and...I couldn't stand it anymore, and...I guess I thought it might make you feel better?"

"Oh." Bret said.

"So...um...did it?" Jemaine asked, figuring he might as well go for broke.

"I think maybe it did a bit." Bret said, after thinking for a moment. "Yeah. A little."

"Good," Jemaine said, pleased with himself, then, because he couldn't not ask, "you don't think it was a really weird thing to do...?"

"Well...a bit," Bret admitted, and Jemaine's face fell, "but s'OK."

Jemaine wondered why he felt slightly hurt that Bret thought it was weird. Shouldn't he himself think it was weird too? 

"Look, I'm sorry I...you know...cried on you..." Bret said, embarrassed, "I guess I'm pretty pathetic aren't I?"

"Yeah, maybe," Jemaine agreed, playfully. "But that's alright."

"I just can't stand the thought of Maisie being hurt and not being able to do anything about it, you know?" Bret explained.

"I get it," Jemaine said.

"Thanks, Jemaine," Bret said, gratefully, and finally took some of the toilet paper Jemaine had brought for him and began wiping his face.

"So, is your mum gonna call back later to let you know what's happening?" Jemaine asked.

"Yeah," Bret confirmed, "hopefully in the next couple of hours. I just really hope Maisie'll be OK."

Jemaine watched Bret for a minute, terrified that the waterworks would start up again as Jemaine was quite certain he had exhausted every possible thing he could think to do to make Bret feel better, but Bret seemed to be holding himself together, much to Jemaine's relief.

"Look what you've done to my shirt, Bret" Jemaine joked, pretending to be annoyed and pointing out the wet splotches on his front, "I mean, I just finished cleaning up a slimy mess in the elevator and now this!"

"Whatever," Bret said, "just think of it as payback for you getting egg all over my shoes." he smirked.

Jemaine suddenly had an idea.

"Bret," Jemaine began, "would you be alright if I popped over to the corner store for a few minutes?"

"Yeah," Bret answered, "why?"

"Just want to pick up a couple of things." Jemaine said, mysteriously.

Jemaine stood up, hesitantly, not really wanting to leave Bret.

He went to the door, put on his shoes and jacket then looked over at Bret again, who was currently blowing his nose.

"You sure you'll be OK?" Jemaine asked again.

"Yes," Bret answered, "I'm sure." Bret forced a smile.

"OK," Jemaine said, as satisfied as he was going to be, "I won't be more than 15 minutes, alright?" 

"K." Bret answered, finally getting up from the couch to toss out the sodden tissues and headed towards the bathroom to wash his face.

\----------------------------------------------------------------------

Jemaine, true to his word, returned to the apartment in about 15 minutes. Bret was sitting on the couch, plucking absently at his guitar.

"Hey, man," Bret called as Jemaine set down a bag on the table, "what'd you get?"

Jemaine smiled and opened up the bag. He brought out another bag, reached into that bag to reveal something wrapped in yet another bag, then finally retrieved a fresh carton of eggs from that bag. Bret couldn't help but smile a little at the extreme precautions Jemaine had gone to to avoid breaking these eggs.

"I figured I'd make us some scrambled eggs for dinner," Jemaine said, "You know, cause they're you're favorite."

"Thanks, man," Bret said.

"And, since I thought we might be up a bit late tonight waiting for your mum to call, I also got this," Jemaine produced a black VHS rental case and a package of microwave popcorn from the bag, "It's Top Gun." 

"Cool!" Bret said, face lighting up, "But, I thought you hated that movie?"

"I don't hate it," Jemaine said, "I just don't like it as much as you do."

"Thanks, Jemaine," Bret said, getting up from the couch to take the tape from Jemaine, "you're the best."

"I know," Jemaine said loftily, with a faux-smug smile. Bret punched him lightly on the arm.

"Oh, I almost forgot" Jemaine said, reaching into the bag again, "I bought us a box of tissue...figured it might be good to have around in case anyone ever needs it..."

Jemaine set the box on the table next to the couch and Bret smiled and rolled his eyes a bit.

"So, you gonna make those eggs or what?" Bret asked, playfully.

"So demanding..." Jemaine said, but quickly set about getting the supplies together to make the eggs while Bret sat back down on the couch with his guitar.

Jemaine grated some cheese and chopped up some tomatoes and onions to stir into the eggs because he knew Bret liked them that way. It felt good to be doing something nice for Bret, and he found himself wondering why he didn't do things like this more often. 

The eggs were done cooking in no time (Jemaine was quite glad that Bret's favorite dish wasn't something horribly complicated) and Jemaine set out the plates on the table. Bret jumped up from the couch and they both sat down to eat.

"Mmm," Bret said as he took a bite, "these are REALLY good, Jemaine."

"Glad you like them," Jemaine smiled, and took a bite. They were quite good.

"Why are you being so nice to me?" Bret asked, shoveling more eggs into his mouth.

"I don't know," Jemaine answered, suddenly feeling defensive, "can't a guy make dinner for his best friend to cheer him up?"

"Yeah, of course," Bret said, "it's just, usually you don't do things like this."

Jemaine just shrugged and tried to act nonchalant. He commenced eating the rest of his eggs and, after a moment, Bret did the same.

After they had eaten their fill, they settled down in the lounge to watch Top Gun. Bret sat on the couch to be near the phone and Jemaine settled in the armchair.

The movie was a bit better than Jemaine remembered it being, but still wasn't exactly his cup of tea. As it went on, Jemaine found himself sneaking looks at Bret occasionally, happy to see that he was looking considerably less miserable. Jemaine was quite proud of himself that he had apparently succeeded in making Bret feel better. Maybe he wasn't quite so bad at these things as he had thought.

After a little while, Bret got up to make the popcorn and, once he had been handed his bowl, Jemaine decided to amuse himself through the more slow moving parts of the film by tossing the occasional kernel in the direction of the couch, trying to get them to stick in Bret's hair without him noticing.

Bret noticed every time of course, and retaliated in kind. They carried on this way, alternating between eating and throwing, until their bowls were empty and the area between the couch and the chair was littered with bits of poorly aimed popcorn. Bret rose and picked up the mess, then began to walk toward the kitchen to toss out the uneaten kernels. He then thought better of it and decided to dump the whole lot on Jemaine's head, laughing hysterically.

Jemaine dusted himself off and went to lunge at Bret in retaliation when the phone suddenly rang. Bret abruptly stopped laughing and glanced at Jemaine with a worried look in his eyes. Jemaine, forgetting all about delivering Bret's well-deserved payback, just nodded encouragingly. Bret answered the phone, beginning to pace in the kitchen as he was much too nervous to stand still.

Jemaine listened, anxiously, to Bret's side of the conversation. He really hoped Maisie had pulled through. From what Bret had told him earlier, it seemed likely that she would, and he had told Bret everything would be OK, but, realistically speaking, the dog was old, anything could have happened.

"Hi Mum," Bret said, gingerly, "how is she doing...? Yeah...OK...oh thank god!"

Jemaine allowed himself to breathe. Maisie was OK, which meant Bret would be OK. Jemaine stood up and walked over next to Bret, smiling at him.

Bret quickly finished the conversation with his mum and hung up the phone.

"She's OK!" Bret announced happily and hugged Jemaine joyfully. Jemaine hugged him back for a second, then they broke apart, feeling suddenly uncomfortable. Jemaine looked toward the wall and Bret looked at the floor.

"Uh...that's great!" Jemaine said, smiling, but still not really looking at Bret, not quite sure how things became so awkward so quickly. "I'm really glad, mate."

"Me too," Bret said, moving to sit back down on the couch, "what a relief."

"Yeah." Jemaine agreed, quickly gathering up the spilled popcorn then sitting back down in the armchair.

"Shall we finish the movie?" Bret asked, "s'only about 15 minutes left."

"Yeah, sure." Jemaine agreed, and Bret pressed play.

\-----------------------------------------------------

Once the movie was over they both agreed that sleep would be a good idea as it was getting quite late.

They got ready for bed silently and only after they were both settled and the were lights off did Bret speak.

"Jemaine?" Bret said, sleepily.

"Yeah?" Jemaine answered.

"Thanks...you know...for today."

"Oh, yeah, no problem. Goodnight, Bret."

"Night Jemaine."

Jemaine rolled over to face the wall, then finally allowed himself to really think about what had happened that day. He wracked his brain to figure out exactly what had possessed him to kiss Bret like he did. He tried to tell himself it was completely innocent, just a friendly gesture, a last ditch, pull-out-all-the-stops attempt to get Bret to calm down when nothing else was working - and it was in a way - but Jemaine was forced to admit that that couldn't have been the only reason behind the kiss. If it was, he probably would have forgotten all about it shortly afterward instead of expending all of his willpower in order to avoid spending the entire evening going over every single detail again and again in his mind. The coarseness of Bret's beard against his palms, the softness of Bret's lips against his, the salty taste of Bret's tears...

Why was this so hard to put out of his mind? And why did he want nothing more than to do it again?

Jemaine shook his head in a futile attempt to rid himself of all thoughts of Bret and the kiss. He closed his eyes, willing sleep to come because he knew if he allowed himself to dwell on those questions for too long, the answers would ultimately raise more questions that he was quite certain he was not prepared to face just yet.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bret and Jemaine are both a little perplexed at how they feel after Jemaine's surprise kiss.

Bret awoke the next morning before the alarm went off and stretched languidly. He had slept remarkably well the night before. He knew he had dreamed but the majority of the details fell out of his head the moment he tried to remember them. That always puzzled Bret. He pictured it like trying to hold water in your hands - after a minute all you were left with was a few meager drops but nothing of substance.

All he could recall from his dream was the feeling of strong arms holding him tightly, making him feel safe. 

He looked over at Jemaine's sleeping form and thought back to the previous evening with a mixture of embarrassment, fondness, and more than a bit of confusion.

Thinking about things in the light of day, Bret realized he had probably overreacted a bit to Maisie's accident. He felt a little silly now for getting so upset when everything ended up being just fine. 

Despite the fact that Jemaine probably thought he was acting like a crazy person, Bret was grateful Jemaine had been there, otherwise he likely would have moped about all evening, driving himself more and more crazy with worry as he waited for his mum's call. 

Bret thought again about how nice it had felt to have Jemaine's arms around him. The familiar smell of Jemaine's shirt, the strong hands on his back, the low voice speaking words that...OK, well the words themselves weren't all that important as they had been predictably awkward, but the sentiment behind them was there. Jemaine had done his best to help Bret. And that made Bret feel...well, he wasn't quite sure exactly. It made him feel probably better than it should.

Bret was still quite confused over the fact that Jemaine had kissed him. He'd never done anything like that before and Bret wondered how Jemaine had come up with the idea of kissing Bret to make him feel better. The funny thing about it was, it HAD made Bret feel better. Truthfully, it had made him feel quite good in a way that scared him a little. 

Not to mention, Jemaine had then spent the rest of the evening being impossibly nice to Bret, which just served to further his confusion. 

Bret looked over at Jemaine again, still sleeping, and furrowed his brow. Maybe he was reading too much into this. Bret had probably just freaked Jemaine out which made him act overly nice to avoid being cried on again. That was the most likely explanation. 

Though it still didn't explain the kiss... 

Bret didn't want to think about this anymore, it was making his head hurt. They had a gig at the library in a couple of hours and they really should get some practice in before they left. 

He got out of bed and went to wake Jemaine.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bret kicked a can angrily as they walked back from their gig at the library. Or, rather, what was supposed to have been their gig at the library. 

The day had started off well enough, they had gotten up, eaten breakfast, and practiced a bit.

Bret had noticed that Jemaine was acting a little bit strange. He was definitely paying more attention to what Bret was doing than he usually did, however Bret just attributed it to the fact that Jemaine likely thought Bret was still a bit fragile. This idea made Bret both annoyed and touched in equal measure so he did his best to ignore it and tried to act as normal as possible so as not to worry Jemaine unnecessarily.

Much to Bret's relief, things seemed to have gone back into a familiar rhythm by the time they had finished their walk to the library, guitars in tow.

They had gone to their usual spot, gotten all set up, and were just about to start in on "Rock the Party" when the librarian came up to them and informed them that they wouldn't be requiring their services anymore as too many patrons had complained about the noise. They weren't even going to get paid.

So, needless to say, Bret's mood had soured a bit.

"Bret," Jemaine said, uneasily, "calm down."

"I am calm," Bret said, as he caught up with the can and kicked it again, "I'm just mad, that's all."

"Well, mad is pretty much the opposite of calm, so..." Jemaine mumbled.

"I just wish for once we could have a gig where the people in the audience actually WANTED to hear us play." Bret complained.

"Mel wants to hear us play," Jemaine offered, lamely.

"OK, then I wish we could have a gig where more than one person in the audience wanted to hear us," Bret clarified.

"I know, me too," Jemaine agreed, not sure what else to say, he wasn't exactly happy about the gig being canceled either, but at least the librarian lady had been nice about it. Plus she'd given them free biscuits because she felt bad, so it hadn't been a total wash.

"And where was Murray, anyway?" Bret asked, "shouldn't he have been able to do something?"

"He had to take his car to the shop, remember?" Jemaine said, "he said he might drop by the library during the second half, but I guess that won't be happening."

"Do you think we should call him?" Bret asked.

"Didn't he say he lost his phone?" Jemaine asked.

"I don't know, maybe, that sounds like something he'd do," Bret said. "Yeah, I guess he'll figure it out then."

The arrived at their apartment after what felt like hours and Bret slumped down on the couch, still feeling dejected. 

"Don't mope, Bret," Jemaine said, settling down on the opposite end of the couch, "want to watch 'The Dog Show'?"

"No."

"How about 'What Have You Done To My House'?" Jemaine tried.

"No," Bret answered, sullenly, "we've seen them all a hundred times."

"Oh, OK," Jemaine said, and sighed. 

Bret briefly looked over at Jemaine and noticed he was pouting slightly, brow furrowed. Bret suddenly found himself wondering if Jemaine might try to kiss him again. After all, Bret being upset had been the reason for the last kiss so maybe, since he was sort of upset now, Jemaine might do it again.

Bret still wasn't quite sure if he actually wanted Jemaine to kiss him again. The first one had come as such a surprise he'd barely had time to register what was happening before it was all over. So really, he had no way of knowing for sure if he had really liked it or not since it had happened so fast. It would probably best if it happened again when Bret could be prepared for it, so he would know to pay attention this time.

That was, of course, if Jemaine even wanted to kiss him again.

Though he realized this was probably crazy, Bret decided to try a little experiment.

He sighed heavily then looked at Jemaine. 

Jemaine continued staring straight ahead, not paying any attention.

Bret sighed again, louder this time.

Jemaine turned his head to look at him, but said nothing.

Bret exhaled loudly and moved to lie down, knees curled up against his chest, head on the armrest.

"Are you alright, Bret?" Jemaine asked, tentatively.

Bret just shrugged.

"It was just a stupid gig, right?" Jemaine said, "there'll be others...probably."

Bret didn't say anything.

They sat in uncomfortable silence for a few minutes.

"Uh...I'm kinda tired," Jemaine announced, rising from the couch, "I think I'm going to have a sleep."

"K," Bret said, trying to sound as miserable as possible.

Jemaine looked at him awkwardly for a moment then went into the bedroom and crawled into bed.

After a few moments, Bret stretched out on the couch and sighed - for real this time. What was he doing? He didn't really want Jemaine to kiss him again, did he? He thought about it a bit and was forced to grudgingly admit to himself that he sort of did. But he also knew that he didn't want Jemaine to kiss him based on some stupid lie or exaggeration. 

The point was likely moot anyway. The experiment had failed. Jemaine hadn't tried to kiss him again so Bret resigned himself to the fact that what had happened the previous night was just a one time incident that didn't mean anything to Jemaine and therefore, shouldn't mean anything to Bret either.

He purposely ignored the little voice in his head asking why he seemed to think it did anyway.

\-----------------------------------------------------------------------

"Jemaine...Jemaine!"

"What?" Jemaine said, sleepily.

"You've been sleeping for like 2 hours, man," Bret said, standing over Jemaine's bed.

"Have I?" Jemaine asked, and groped around for his glasses.

"Yeah," Bret confirmed, "Just thought you might want to get up."

"Yeah, thanks," Jemaine sat up in bed.

"I gotta go to work but I'll be back at the usual time, K?" Bret said.

"OK."

"See you later." Bret called as he went through the bedroom archway.

"Yeah, see you." Jemaine said, swinging his legs over the side of the bed and standing up. 

Jemaine stretched then went to go sit on the couch, trying to clear his head of the annoying fuzzy feeling he always got when he slept too much in the middle of the day.

Bret had seemed a bit cheerier, which was good. Jemaine had felt a bit bad for going for a sleep when Bret had been a bit out of sorts about the canceled gig, but Jemaine had managed to make himself all flustered thinking about ways he could cheer him up - some of the ideas that had popped into his head were just...well, he didn't think Bret would find them all that appropriate. Hell, Jemaine wasn't sure if he found them appropriate himself. Leave it to his imagination to find the worst possible time to fly into overdrive. 

It didn't matter anyway, as Bret had obviously managed to get over his bad mood on his own.

Still, Jemaine thought, it wouldn't hurt to do something nice for Bret anyway. Jemaine would have to have a bit of a think about what that something would be, however.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Jemaine had gone for a bike ride to get some air and clear his head when the idea had come to him. 

He would make Bret a cake.

Bret loved cake, and they hadn't made one for at least a couple of months. 

Jemaine's first idea had been to write a song for Bret, but then he remembered the fiasco that had ensued the last time he had done that and decided that cake was a much safer option.

Jemaine headed home, pleased with himself, thinking about what kind of cake he would make and what sort of frosting he would put on it. He still had a couple of hours until Bret would be back so he would have plenty of time to get it ready for when Bret came home.

\----------------------------------------------------------------------

The cake was turning out to be a disaster. Jemaine thought he may have measured some of the ingredients wrong as the cake had a sort of deflated, lop-sided appearance. He had tasted the batter before pouring it into the cake tin and it had seemed alright, but obviously something had gone wrong. 

Oh well, Jemaine thought, frosting would fix everything. The cake was chocolate, so Jemaine figured he would try vanilla frosting. He followed the recipe extremely carefully and came out with a decent batch of frosting. Good texture, tasted fine, OK, now he was getting somewhere.

Jemaine set about frosting the cake and discovered that it wasn't as easy as it looked. Bret usually did this. Jemaine just felt like a big clumsy oaf. He couldn't get the technique down. He managed to accidentally slice into the cake in a few parts, and the chocolaty crumbs were getting all mixed in with the white icing giving it an unappealing, flecked appearance.

He looked at the clock. Bret would be home soon so there was no time to re-do it. Jemaine briefly entertained the thought of just throwing the whole thing out, but that seemed a bit of a waste.

He looked at his creation and frowned. It needed something else.

Suddenly he had an idea. They had a small tube of blue decorative icing left over from god knows when they had last made a cake. Jemaine retrieved it from the back of the cupboard and poised the open tube over the cake, trying to be as steady as possible.

He would write Bret's name on the cake. That would be a nice thing to do, right?

He started with the B, and it looked OK, then the R...that looked a bit weird, but it was legible, then the E...

Jemaine was suddenly gripped with panic. He couldn't write Bret's name on the cake! It was too much. It would weird Bret out. He wondered, briefly, if he could get away with passing it off as a birthday cake - did they even have candles? - then remembered that Bret's birthday was nearly 5 months away, so that wouldn't do.

He had to be more subtle about this niceness thing or else Bret would know something was up. He might guess that Jemaine was having...inappropriate feeling for him. And Jemaine knew he needed to deal with these feelings on his own without Bret finding out or he would just ruin everything.

Jemaine looked at the clock again...crap, Bret would be home any minute.

He wracked his brain for something else he could write on the cake that started with B-R-E and wasn't too weird or gay or anything.

After a moment, certain that every sound he heard in the hallway was Bret making his way to their front door, Jemaine wrote the first word that came into his mind and hoped for the best.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Hey, man," Bret said as he entered the apartment, walking his bike in. 

"Hi," Jemaine said, nonchalantly from the couch where he was flipping through a magazine.

"Mmm, what smells so good?" Bret asked, removing his hair helmet.

"Oh, I made a cake," Jemaine said, still not looking up from his reading material.

"Awesome!" Bret said, heading towards the table to take a look.

"Yeah," Jemaine said, "I just, wanted some cake, you know. You can have some if you like. Whatever..."

"Jemaine..." Bret asked.

"Yes, Bret?" Jemaine asked.

"Why does it say 'BREAST' on this cake?"

"What are you talking about?" Jemaine asked.

"The cake you made...you wrote the word 'BREAST' on it." Bret clarified

"Did I?" Jemaine asked, innocently.

"Yeah," Bret said, puzzled, "you...didn't know that?"

"Hmm," Jemaine said, rising from the couch to have a look, "well isn't that funny. I was just writing random letters to use up the rest of that blue icing. Weird how it wound up spelling out an actual word..."

"Uh huh..." Bret said, knowing Jemaine was lying but utterly confused as to why. It was always difficult to argue with Jemaine once he got into that weird denial routine that he did on occasion. Bret had learned that most of the time it was best to just ignore it. Still, what an odd thing to write on a cake...

\--------------------------------------------------------

The next day they sat in Murray's office at the New Zealand Consulate. Murray had called them the night before, quite annoyed that they hadn't thought to tell him about the library gig being cancelled, and had scheduled an emergency band meeting to discuss it.

Bret had suggested bringing the rest of the cake to Murray as a peace offering and Jemaine had reluctantly agreed. They'd each had a piece of it the night before - despite its appearance, it tasted quite good - however the blue letters had remained basically untouched. Jemaine had put the cake on his lap as they rode the bus to the meeting, garnering funny looks from the other passengers.

"Bret?"

"Yes."

"Jemaine?"

"Yeah."

"And, Murray; present." Murray said, a look of satisfaction on his face has they completed the roll call. "First item of business, library gig; canceled; Murray not informed; why?"

"I tried to tell you last night, we were gonna call you but we thought you'd lost your phone," Jemaine protested.

"Well, I had lost my phone," Murray admitted, "but you could have at least tried it, I had it back by the time I left the mechanics."

"What was wrong with your car, anyway?" Bret asked.

"The driver's seat was making ringing noises," Murray said, sheepishly.

"Did you lose your phone under the seat again, Murray?" Jemaine asked, trying to suppress a grin.

"I don't see how it's any of your business, Jemaine, but yes," Murray admitted, embarrassed.

"This has happened like 3 times already," Bret pointed out, "why didn't you just take a look under the seat when you heard it ringing?"

"Safety first, Bret," Murray said, sagely, "it might have been a bomb under there for all I knew. I'm no...vehicle expert...person. 'Just take a look under the seat' - what if I had been blown up! That wouldn't be very good would it?"

"I guess not," Bret said.

"No it wouldn't!" Murray agreed. "Anyway, we've gotten off topic now, discussing my car is not on the schedule...ah yes, we're still at item one: why wasn't I informed about the gig being canceled. I sat there for an hour waiting for you two turkeys. The only thing to do was watch a clown doing magic tricks and reading to a bunch of children. Then I guess some parents complained because the next thing I knew security was escorting me from the library! They thought I was some sort of deviant - it was humiliating!" 

"We just told you, Murray," Jemaine said, exasperated, "we didn't think you had your phone."

"Oh, yes," Murray agreed, "you did say that. Well, next time, no excuses." He looked at Bret and Jemaine pointedly and they nodded.

"We're sorry, Murray," Bret said, picking up the cake from where it had been sitting under Jemaine's seat, "but we brought you a cake to make it up to you - Jemaine made it."

"How nice!" Murray said, face lighting up, "you made this for me, Jemaine?"

"Well..." Jemaine started, "I actually made it for...yeah, I did."

"Well thank you...wait..." Murray said, furrowing his brow and taking a closer look, "BREAST? Why does it say 'BREAST'?"

"Ask Jemaine," Bret said, still having no idea why Jemaine had chosen that particular word with which to decorate the cake.

"Jemaine, this is inappropriate," Murray said, lowering his voice, "what if a lady were to walk by and see this! I could be fired for sexual harassment!"

"It's just a word, Murray," Jemaine protested, "it doesn't mean anything."

"Of course it does, Jemaine!" Murray said, voice a loud whisper, "it means, breast! Tit! Boob! Knocker..." Murray was turning a bit red.

"OK, OK!" Jemaine interrupted, very much needing to not hear any more slang terms for breast come out of Murray's mouth, "I know what it MEANS, but it's just a word...just a random word..."

"And why are there pieces already cut out of it?" Murray asked.

"We...um...had to make sure it wasn't poisoned," Bret replied, unconvincingly.

"Poisoned? Why would it be poisoned?" Murray asked, incredulous.

"Dunno," Bret shrugged, "but safety first."

"I suppose you're right, you can't be too careful." Murray conceded.

Jemaine shot Bret a look.

"Tsk tsk...I've seen...'erotic'...cakes before," Murray said, leaning in closer, "but usually they're in the shape of breasts, or have a picture of a lady's breasts drawn on them. They don't just say the word 'Breast'! That's...well that's just weird is what that is..."

"That's what I tried to tell him," Bret said.

"Oh, can you just leave it alone, Bret!" Jemaine snapped, "that's the last time I make a cake for you..." he said, under his breath.

"What? The cake was for me?" Bret asked, puzzled.

"Um...no..." Jemaine stammered.

"But you just said..." 

"I think you're just hearing what you want to hear," Jemaine mumbled, not looking at Bret.

"Come on, guys," Murray interrupted, as he used a spoon he'd found in his drawer to remove the B and the R from the top of the cake so as not to offend any passing ladies, "we're getting off topic again. We'll never get this meeting finished at this rate. Item two...ah yes, do either of you know a good mechanic? Mine won't let me come back again and I should probably get someone else lined up in case of another bomb scare."

\----------------------------------------------------------------

Bret looked at Jemaine, who was staring sullenly out the window, as they rode the bus back to their apartment. Jemaine had been silent since they had left the meeting and Bret was wondering what the problem was. Was he really this annoyed about a stupid cake?

They got off at their stop, walked the few short blocks to the apartment, and stepped into the elevator.

"Jemaine?" Bret said, knowing he probably shouldn't press the issue, but not being able to stop himself.

"What?"

"Did you...make that cake for me?" Bret asked.

"No!" Jemaine scoffed, "But so what if I did?"

"It's fine if you did, I just...was still wondering why it said...you know...what it said on it?" Bret asked.

"I don't know," Jemaine said, still defensive, "maybe I was going to put your name on it but... your name was too short and I had to fill in some space between the E and the T...maybe I thought it was your birthday then remembered it wasn't...maybe I wanted to draw breasts on it but couldn't so I just wrote the word...or...maybe the cake wasn't really for you and I was just joking...look, it's our floor."

Bret stood, mouth agape, as Jemaine exited the elevator. After Jemaine's bizarre "explanation" Bret was even more confused. He quickly followed Jemaine as he unlocked the front door and made his way into the apartment.

"Jemaine..." Bret began, "are you OK? You're acting kinda..."

"Fine!" Jemaine said, with a forced smile, "I'm fine, Bret. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go take a shower."

And before Bret could get out another word, Jemaine had locked himself in the bathroom and started the shower running. 

Bret sat down in one of the kitchen chairs, utterly perplexed, trying to make sense of Jemaine's odd behavior.

Meanwhile, Jemaine sat, fully clothed, on the closed lid of the toilet with his head in his hands, as the bathroom slowly filled up with steam. What was he doing? Why couldn't he just be aloof about this like he was about everything else? Why was Bret driving him so crazy? How could he make these feelings go away? 

And did he even want them to?


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jemaine is seriously falling for Bret and it’s taking over his life. Also, Jemaine injures himself and Bret takes care of him because he’s awesome like that.

Jemaine moaned into Bret's mouth as skillful hands moved all over his body. When they finally broke apart from the kiss Jemaine looked down into Bret's warm brown eyes and saw a devious smile tug at the corners of his mouth as his head moved lower and lower until...oh god, Bret! The feeling was indescribable. Jemaine's hands worked their way into Bret's curly hair as Bret's mouth did impossibly wonderful things to him, his climax building and building until...

Jemaine's eyes flew open and he sat up in bed with a start. He looked around, certain that Bret must have heard him this time, but no, Bret was still sleeping, soundly, in his bed across the room.

Jemaine fell back onto his pillow and tried to stifle the groan of frustration that escaped him. This was the 8th night in a row. He couldn't take this anymore. Every night Bret came into his dreams and they did incredible, debauched things to each other, and every night Jemaine awoke from these dreams alone in his bed, sweating, rock hard, and increasingly frustrated with both the situation and himself.

To say he had failed in his attempt to get over this...thing...whatever it was, for Bret, would be the understatement of the century. It seemed that the more Jemaine tried to keep Bret (and Bret's mouth...Bret's hands...) out of his mind, the more pervasive the thoughts became. The most Jemaine had been able to do was attempt to compartmentalize things and only allow himself to really think about Bret and all of the filthy things he wanted to do with him at night when it was dark. 

This had sort of worked at first, but since it was hardly just about sex, even ordinary things that Bret would do or say during the day would get Jemaine all worked up. 

It certainly didn't help that Bret seemed to be getting more touchy-feely with Jemaine lately, though Jemaine honestly couldn't tell if Bret was actually touching him more than usual, or if he was just hyper-aware of everything Bret was doing.

He definitely wanted sex with Bret, but he wanted it to come along with other things too, like cuddling and going on dates and just spending time together - all of those coupley things that he usually found to be a bit of a chore with the women he dated. Jemaine had finally had to admit to himself that he was falling hopelessly in love with his best friend. 

Since that realization, Jemaine had lain awake every night wondering if it would be possible to rid himself of these feelings. Or, at the very least, reduce them to the point where he could tolerate them, not to mention sleep at night again. 

Since he'd had plenty of time to think about it, he realized he'd always been a little bit attracted to Bret since shortly after they first met. But Jemaine used to think those were relatively normal feelings to have towards a best friend, and any time they had became too intense or inappropriate in the past he had crammed those feelings into that place in his brain where he put all of the things he found too confusing or too scary to think about. 

The kiss had just brought everything to the surface and Jemaine was woefully unprepared to deal with the intensity of it all.

He fumbled around for his glasses, put them on, and looked over at Bret who was still sound asleep. His lips were slightly parted and his hair was adorably mussed. Jemaine's heart ached. He longed to crawl into that bed and just be close to Bret all night.

After a few minutes of staring at his roommate's sleeping form, Jemaine got out of bed and went into the bathroom to take care of his maddeningly persistent erection.

He jerked off roughly, came quickly, and cleaned himself off, not feeling anywhere near as satisfied as he usually did after a wank.

Jemaine then left the bathroom, fell back into bed, and shut his eyes tightly, trying (and failing) to not think about anything at all. 

 

\----------------------------------------------------------------

Bret had noticed that Jemaine had continued being quite nice to him after the cake-incident several weeks back (which Bret was careful not to bring up again as it seemed to be a touchy subject for Jemaine - Bret was still confused as to why that was, but he figured he would just have to drop it), and Bret had decided he should respond in kind. 

Whenever he'd make tea for himself he'd offer Jemaine some, if he picked up food on his way home from work he'd get Jemaine some as well, if he saw something in Dave's shop that he thought Jemaine might like he'd buy it for him (if it was cheap, of course, the gigs were still few and far between so he couldn't afford extravagance - not that anything in Dave's shop could be called extravagant by any means).

Jemaine had been doing the same, he cooked for them most nights, and tidied up the apartment so often that Bret rarely had to do much of anything. It was nice, if still a little confusing.

Bret found his feelings for Jemaine evolving into something more than just friendship. He still couldn't put into words what those feelings were exactly, but he did know that in addition to wanting to be around Jemaine all the time, he craved contact. He found himself constantly making up excuses to touch Jemaine. They were all seemingly innocent reasons, of course, but every time they touched it felt electric. It was as though he was developing an addiction to touching Jemaine and he turned it into a sort of game with how many times he could do it in a day. It was almost like he was testing himself (and Jemaine) to see how far he could take it, to see if maybe Jemaine was feeling the same things.

Some days Jemaine didn't seem to notice or care, but other days he seemed a bit flustered or weirded out. Bret still couldn't quite figure out if Jemaine liked it or not, but Jemaine never really reciprocated, forcing Bret to admit that the possibility of things getting much further than friendship with Jemaine was pretty remote. 

That didn't mean he was going to stop though.

 

\------------------------------------------------------------------

 

"You’re not actually going to wear that, are you?" Jemaine asked, pointing at the crumpled shirt in Bret’s hands.

"Yeah," Bret answered, puzzled "why not?"

"Because it’s..." Jemaine began, then, realizing any explanation he could offer would likely be futile, he gave up, "...nevermind. Oh crap, walk faster, there’s Mel!"

Bret got a wild look in his eye and they both tried to escape, but she caught up with them before they could get very far.

"Hey guys!" Mel greeted them.

"Hey Mel," Bret and Jemaine mumbled in unison.

"What are you guys up to?" Mel asked, sunnily.

"Nothing," Jemaine said, "we're just on our way home."

"Cool," Mel said, "what’s that in your hand, Bret?"

"Just a shirt," Bret said, and held it up to show her.

"Oh," Mel said, eyes widening crazily, "it’s not for a girl is it? You don’t have a girlfriend, do you...?"

"No," Bret answered, confused, "it’s for me, got it at Dave’s shop."

"Oh! Oh good!" Mel said, smiling again. "Hey, did I show you guys the story I’m writing?"

"No," Bret answered, much to Jemaine’s chagrin.

Mel smiled bashfully and took a large stack of paper out of her bag. "It’s loosely based on you guys, but it’s not REALLY you…just, you know, fictionalized versions…"

Bret flipped through the pages briefly and blushed, quickly handing it back to Mel.

"Yeah, sorry, we don’t really have time to read that right now, Mel," Jemaine said, "or ever..." he mumbled under his breath

"Maybe later then," Mel said, "I understand, it’s pretty long. But I should at least show you my illustrations!"

To Jemaine’s horror Mel reached into her bag again and produced some sketches that were obviously supposed to be of Bret and Jemaine in various stages of undress doing a variety of increasingly naughty things to each other. 

"Um, that’s OK, Mel!" Jemaine squeaked, shoving the pictures back towards her, hoping that nobody passing by got a look at them, "we really do have to go!" He nudged Bret and they began to walk briskly away, ignoring Mel’s attempt at a goodbye.

Jemaine tried not to look at Bret as he willed the redness to fade from his cheeks. Explicit visual aides to his dirty thoughts were really not what Jemaine needed right now.

\-----------------------------------------------

 

Even though most of Bret’s wardrobe consisted of somewhat bizarre animal t-shirts, Bret’s new shirt was truly ridiculous, Jemaine thought as he did the dishes. Dave had sold it to Bret for $1.50 because he couldn’t get rid of it and it was apparently ‘queering up’ the store. 

Jemaine kept stealing glances at Bret, who was currently sitting in his favorite box, watching television, eating a sandwich, and, of course, proudly sporting his new shirt – a tan colored tee (in what Jemaine was certain was a child’s size large instead of a men’s - it was quite tight and showed off Bret’s body nicely, much to Jemaine’s frustration) with a giant, smiling, sparkly unicorn splashed garishly over the front. 

The fact that Jemaine still found Bret attractive and desirable while he was wearing this monstrosity, cemented his knowledge that he was definitely, without a doubt, in a ridiculous amount of love with Bret.

'Stupid sexy Bret in his stupid se...stupid shirt,' Jemaine thought miserably as he washed a glass. He continued staring at Bret while he moved to put the glass on the drying rack, but it slipped out of his grasp. Without thinking, he made a grab for it but, instead of catching it, wound up smashing the glass between his hand and the front of the counter. 

 

\--------------------------------------------------

 

Bret looked up from his television program the second he heard the sound of the glass breaking.

"You OK, Jemaine?" he asked.

"Uh…no…not really..." Jemaine replied shakily.

Bret put his sandwich down, got out of the box, and went towards the kitchen. 

"Watch out for the glass!" Jemaine warned, cradling his left hand in his right, blood trickling down the sides.

Bret didn’t really care about the glass, he wanted to help Jemaine, but he was careful to brush the larger pieces out of the way with his shoe before he made his way to where Jemaine was standing.

Bret didn’t particularly like the sight of blood, but he knew Jemaine was much more squeamish. Most people didn’t know that about Jemaine because he didn’t get bothered by blood in movies or sporting events, but when it came to his own blood he could actually be somewhat of a hypochondriac. 

Bret knew he had to be strong for Jemaine to keep him from panicking. 

Jemaine’s injured hand was mostly closed and he looked at Bret with a frightened expression on his face.

"It’ll be OK, Jemaine," Bret said in the most reassuring tone he could muster, "just let me see it."

Jemaine grimaced but allowed Bret to take his hand and slowly uncurl his fingers from the loose fist he had instinctively made. 

"OK, don’t freak out," Bret began, "but there’s still a piece of glass in here."

"Get it out," Jemaine pleaded, voice firm but with an edge of panic.

"OK, I will," Bret said, trying to sound as calm as possible. "You should probably sit down first..."

Bret led Jemaine to one of the kitchen chairs and took Jemaine’s injured hand in his.

"Maybe don’t watch, OK?" Bret suggested.

Jemaine nodded, closed his eyes tightly and turned away.

Bret gripped the part of the glass that was sticking out of Jemaine’s hand and very gently and carefully lifted it out. "Crap," Bret said, instantly regretting saying that out loud. 

Jemaine, of course, looked down at his hand and saw that the gash was quickly filling up with fresh blood.

"This is bad...this is really bad...is this bad?" Jemaine breathed, sounding terrified.

"It’s OK," Bret reassured him, going immediately to grab the roll of paper towels from the counter, "I know what to do."

Bret was suddenly very glad that his boss had insisted that he and the other sign holders complete a first aid course – holding signs being potentially dangerous work, after all. He roughly folded up several paper towels and pressed them all onto Jemaine’s hand, they quickly soaked through so he folded some more, and once he was satisfied it wasn’t going to bleed through, he tied what he hoped was a clean dishcloth around Jemaine’s hand and knotted it tightly to keep pressure on the wound.

"Just hold it up like this, and make sure the cloth stays tight, OK?" Bret instructed, taking Jemaine’s arm and folding it at the elbow so his injured hand was up near his shoulder. Then he got up and went to the sink.

"We gotta get you to the hospital, man. You need stitches." Bret said as he quickly washed his hands, then took a wet cloth and wiped away any obvious blood from Jemaine’s hands. Jemaine didn’t even seem to notice.

"Come on, get up," Bret said, grabbing Jemaine by his good arm and helping him to stand. 

"Bret..." Jemaine said, quietly.

"Yeah?" Bret asked as he held onto Jemaine’s shoulders and tried to steady him

"Think m’gonna pass out..." Jemaine said, voice shaky.

"No...no you’re not!" Bret insisted, shaking Jemaine’s shoulders a bit, "Jemaine, stay with me," he commanded, looking Jemaine in the eyes. 

This was not good, Bret thought, he could deal with bleeding and panicky Jemaine but bleeding and unconscious Jemaine was an entirely different story.

Jemaine was beginning to turn a sickly gray sort of color and Bret put his hands on Jemaine’s face, trying to get him to focus, "Jemaine! Hey...Jemaine...look at me...you are not gonna pass out!"

Just as Jemaine’s eyes began rolling back into his head Bret smashed his lips against Jemaine’s and kissed him hard.

He pulled away after a couple of seconds and looked at Jemaine. He had his eyes closed, his mouth was slightly open, and he was leaning in towards Bret a bit. After a few seconds his eyes opened and he focused on Bret’s face.

"You with me?" Bret asked.

"Yes," Jemaine answered, breathlessly.

"Good," Bret said, "let’s go."

 

\-----------------------------------------------------

 

Jemaine sat on the table in the small examination room waiting for the nurse to come in and assess the damage to his hand.

The cab ride had been mercifully short and Bret had taken charge once they’d gotten to the emergency room, getting forms filled out and explaining the situation. 

The nurse at reception seemed concerned at the amount of bleeding (it was starting to soak through the paper towels and onto the dish cloth) so she sent them in almost right away to have another nurse take a look at the wound and re-bandage it while they waited for the doctor.

Bret was sitting in a chair a few feet from the examination table. Jemaine noticed Bret sneaking concerned looks at him every so often. Jemaine tried to look away, feeling bad for making Bret worry and more than a little embarrassed about almost fainting earlier.

He was also feeling quite flustered because he could have sworn Bret had kissed him back at the apartment. He could only remember the last bit because he had been in the middle of passing out at the time, but he thought he had felt Bret’s hot breath on his mouth as he'd slowly become aware of his surroundings, and he was almost positive that his lips felt a bit wet and...well...kissed as he had opened his eyes.

He couldn’t be certain though. He briefly entertained the idea of asking Bret about it but thought better of it. He was probably just letting his fantasies bleed over into reality.

After a couple of minutes, the door opened and a frazzled looking, middle-aged, slightly stocky nurse entered the room. 

She introduced herself as Helen and asked to see Jemaine’s hand. He held it out to her, gingerly, and she rather brusquely untied the dish cloth and removed the wads of blood-soaked paper towels. 

"It looks pretty deep," the nurse observed, "it’s still bleeding a little...you didn’t hit an artery but you probably nicked a smaller vein pretty good. I can’t quite tell if there’s any damage to the major tendons or nerves, but the doctor will be able to get a better look."

"Am I going to be OK?" Jemaine asked, not meaning for his voice to come out sounding so high.

"You’ll be just fine," Helen assured him in the tone of someone who says this phrase 1000 times a day to every single patient she sees, regardless of their condition, "I’ll just re-wrap it for you and we’ll get the doctor in to see you as soon as she can to get you stitched up."

Jemaine gulped but tried to remain in control of himself, he didn’t want to freak Bret out, after all.

The nurse re-wrapped his hand with absorbent gauze, manipulating his arm a bit roughly at times, causing him to wince, and then wrapped his hand and wrist in a tight tensor bandage.

"There you go," Helen said as she finished up, removed her gloves, and threw them into a bin in the corner, "try to keep your hand elevated, OK?"

Jemaine nodded.

"The doctor will be in soon," the nurse said before closing the door behind her. Jemaine figured that 'soon' was likely a relative term.

Jemaine still wasn’t looking in Bret’s direction. He wasn’t sure he could handle seeing Bret’s worried face right now while still keeping himself composed.

"See, you’ll be OK, man," Bret assured Jemaine, giving him a friendly pat on the knee before getting up and walking around the small room, "just a few stitches and you’ll be fine, right?"

"Yeah, I guess," Jemaine said, trying to sound upbeat, but feeling anything but - what had that nurse been saying about nerves and tendons? 

"You really gotta stop dropping things, man," Bret said, a playful tone in his voice, "or at least...you know...stop trying to catch them afterward. Though, to be fair, you did manage to catch one of those eggs..."

Jemaine couldn’t help but smile a little. He could tell that Bret was trying to get his mind off of his hand and he was grateful for it.

"...and some of that glass," Jemaine added.

Bret cracked up at this and Jemaine found himself laughing a little too. 

Unfortunately, the melancholy began to creep up on Jemaine again just moments later. He was tired, drained, worried about his hand, but, most pervasively, he was worried about the Bret...love...situation. He had been going back and forth nearly hourly every day for weeks trying to decide what would be worse: driving himself crazy by keeping his feelings from Bret, or telling him and possibly losing Bret forever.

Jemaine looked over at Bret who was busying himself by reading the warning labels on the oxygen tank in the corner and he got that ache in his chest again, that 'I’m-never-going-to-have-him-am-I?' ache and suddenly it all seemed like too much to handle.

Jemaine felt the sting of tears behind his eyes and quickly turned his head so Bret wouldn’t see him. That was the last thing he needed. He’d managed to hurt himself in a stupid way then nearly pass out in front of Bret already today - so he was determined not to cry in front of Bret as well. He wouldn’t do it. He couldn’t.

Jemaine tried to pull it together before any of the tears that were threatening could fall, and, more importantly, before Bret noticed anything.

"Jemaine?" Bret asked, "you OK?"

"Yeah, m’fine," Jemaine answered too quickly, realizing he probably didn’t sound fine at all.

"You sure?" Bret persisted, trying to look at Jemaine’s face but Jemaine kept turning his head. Finally, Bret managed to lock eyes with Jemaine momentarily and noticed a tear trickling slowly from beneath Jemaine’s glasses.

"Jemaine...are you crying?" Bret asked, sounding terribly concerned.

"No!" Jemaine scoffed, "m’not crying..." He looked away from Bret again and quickly swiped at the lone tear that had escaped then tried to casually lift up his glasses and dry his eyes on his shirt. 

After a minute, feeling Bret's eyes on him and realizing the jig was probably up, Jemaine finally turned to look at Bret and shrugged slightly.

"Hey, it'll be OK, man," Bret said, immediately getting up on the table to sit to the right of Jemaine, "Does your hand hurt that badly?"

Jemaine wished it were that simple. "No, it doesn’t really hurt too much," Jemaine replied.

"Then what’s wrong?" Bret asked.

There was so much wrong, Jemaine thought. He desperately wanted to just let it all out, just tell Bret everything, and for a second he thought he might just do it, but by the time he opened his mouth, his brain had decided to stick to slightly less volatile subjects.

"I’m just worried," Jemaine admitted, feeling small and embarrassed.

"About what?" Bret asked.

"You’ll think it’s stupid," Jemaine insisted, and looked at the floor.

"No I won’t," Bret assured him.

"Well...that nurse said something about damaging nerves and tendons..." Jemaine began, "...so what happens if I can’t play my instruments? You might not want me to be in the band anymore..."

"Jemaine," Bret said, "you’ll be fine, OK? You’ll be able to play everything again once it heals up."

"But what if it doesn’t?" Jemaine asked, feeling a bit pathetic. 

"It will," Bret assured him, putting a hand lightly on Jemaine’s shoulder "you can move your fingers, right?"

Jemaine tried and with a bit of pain was able to move his fingers slowly.

"See!" Bret said with a smile, putting his arm around Jemaine’s shoulders, "if you can move your fingers it can’t be that bad, right?"

"I guess not," Jemaine said, surprised to be feeling a bit more relieved. 

"And I'd never kick you out of the band!" Bret assured him, "Even if you had stumps for hands."

"Stumps for hands!" Jemaine exclaimed, "What on earth could I play if I had stumps for hands?"

"Dunno," Bret said, thoughtfully, "you could still sing. You could play the harmonica, the kazoo...or maybe the bongos?"

"I'd quit before we introduced bongos into the band again," Jemaine said, "just makes me think of Todd."

"Yeah, OK," Bret conceded, with a smile, "probably not the bongos."

"I think I got some blood on your shirt," Jemaine pointed out.

"Really?" Bret said, "Aww. Oh well, if it doesn't wash off it'll just look like a really badass unicorn."

"Even if that unicorn was in a heavily armored tank surrounded by hundreds of bloody bodies I don't think it could ever look badass," Jemaine teased.

"Hey, don't mock the unicorn, man," Bret said, a smile in his voice.

"Look, I’m sorry I’m being...you know. I’m sorry." Jemaine mumbled, awkwardly after a minute.

"S’OK," Bret assured him, giving Jemaine’s arm a light squeeze.

Jemaine noticed that Bret was making no effort to remove his arm from around his shoulders and couldn’t stop himself from leaning towards Bret a bit until his head was resting lightly on his friend’s shoulder. 

After a moment, Jemaine found himself opening his mouth to speak: "Bret..." he began.

"Yeah," Bret answered.

"There’s...something I need to tell you..."

"What is it?"

Just then the door began to open. Jemaine, startled, quickly straightened up and cleared his throat as Bret pulled away from him and moved swiftly off the table.

The doctor came in, flipping through Jemaine's chart. She looked to be in her mid-forties, blonde, kinda pretty, Jemaine thought.

"So we've got a pretty deep cut on the left hand that needs stitches, right?" the doctor began, "I'm Dr. Wallace, by the way."

She put down Jemaine's chart and gently reached for his injured hand. "Let's take a look, shall we?" She began to unwrap the tensor bandage and gauze, quite a bit more carefully than the nurse had wrapped it, much to Jemaine's relief.

"You look nervous," Dr. Wallace observed, "don't be. I'll have you fixed up in no time, OK?"

Jemaine nodded.

The doctor took a look at his hand under the light. "You really did a number on yourself, didn't you?" she said, amiably.

"I was trying to catch a glass..." Jemaine explained.

"Next time, just let it fall," Dr. Wallace recommended.

"Definitely," Jemaine agreed.

"I need to get this cleaned out so I can get a better look at the wound," the doctor explained, "this will probably sting."

She reached over onto a table and retrieved what looked like a syringe filled with water with a weird cup attachment on the end. She took Jemaine's hand and began to irrigate the wound. Jemaine winced and tried not to make a sound. She wasn't kidding about the sting. 

He felt Bret put a comforting hand on his shoulder and relaxed a little. 

"Dr. Wallace?" Bret began.

"Yeah?" she answered, not looking up from Jemaine's hand.

"Jemaine was worried about the nerves and stuff in his hand," Bret continued, "see, we're musicians and..."

"You think you won't be able to play anymore?" she guessed.

"Uh...yeah," Jemaine confirmed.

She continued examining his hand now that the blood was mostly washed away. "Hmm..." she said, Jemaine felt a bit panicked for a second, not knowing what 'hmm' was supposed to mean, "it doesn't look to me like you cut anything too crucial - can you wiggle your fingers for me?"

Jemaine did.

"Yeah, you'll be fine," Dr. Wallace assured him, "as soon as the cut's healed up you should be good as new."

"I told you!" Bret said, squeezing Jemaine's shoulder and smiling.

"Thanks," Jemaine said, finally feeling legitimately relieved.

"No problem," she said, smiling, "now I'm just going to get a few things and I'll be back in a minute to stitch that up for you."

Jemaine breathed a sigh of relief as she left. He would still be able to play and he wouldn't be kicked out of the band. 

"See?" Bret said, moving to stand in front of Jemaine, "What'd I tell you? You worry too much, man."

"Yeah, yeah," Jemaine said, unable to avoid smiling a bit at Bret's enthusiasm. "And I'm holding you to that 'never kicking me out of the band' thing, you know. You've seen how clumsy I can be. You'll be eating your words when you wind up having to play a gig with Jemaine 'Stumps-for-Hands' Clemaine!"

Bret laughed and Jemaine joined him. Jemaine loved the sound of Bret's laugh, especially when he was the cause of it. 

Dr. Wallace came back in the room a moment later, holding a tray with various instruments on it. They looked a little intimidating, but Jemaine was determined to be brave.

"D'you need to hold my hand or something while you're getting stitched up?" Bret offered quietly while the doctor had her back to them.

"No!" Jemaine scoffed, "I think I can handle it."

"Alright," Bret shrugged.

"OK," Dr. Wallace said as she turned back to Jemaine, "you ready?"

"Mmhmm," Jemaine said.

"Great. We'll just start by freezing the area a bit." she said, and retrieved a large, terrifying looking needle from the tray beside her.

Jemaine's eyes went as wide as saucers and he instinctively reached his right hand out to Bret, who took it without saying anything. Jemaine glanced at Bret with a grateful look in his eyes and Bret just gave him a reassuring smile.

The doctor smiled briefly at the two of them, then got to work.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It was nearly dark by the time they got home. Jemaine had been stitched up and his hand was wrapped in bandages. 

Bret watched Jemaine, warily, as his friend sank down on the couch and turned the TV on to some game show.

"You doing OK, man?" Bret asked.

"Yeah," Jemaine said, unconvincingly. He'd appeared deep in thought since they had left the hospital, but Bret figured maybe he was just tired.

Bret walked into the kitchen and felt something crunch under his shoes. Oh, flip, he thought, the glass still needed cleaning up. He certainly wasn't going to make Jemaine do it, so Bret retrieved the broom and dustpan and swept up the mess. 

Bret noticed that there was some blood on the floor and on the counter so he soaped up a few paper towels and scrubbed everything clean.

Bret glanced over at Jemaine again as he washed his hands. Jemaine didn't appear to be paying any attention to the television. His brow was furrowed and he was frowning.

Bret was a bit surprised that Jemaine hadn't mentioned anything about the fact that Bret had kissed him earlier. It had been almost an instinctual thing, he knew he had to do something bold to keep Jemaine from fainting and kissing him was the first thing that came to mind. Of course, it wasn't exactly how Bret had envisioned his second kiss with Jemaine, but it had at least prevented Jemaine from passing out. 

Maybe Jemaine just didn't remember it? Or maybe he was weirded out by it and wanted to pretend it didn't happen? Bret was certain that Jemaine had leaned into it a bit though...

Bret shook his head, no sense dwelling on things now. He'd just have to feel out Jemaine's mood over the next couple of days.

Bret's stomach rumbled. They should really have dinner, it was getting kinda late and neither of them had eaten for hours.

"Jemaine?" Bret called out. He got no response. "Jemaine!"

"Yeah, what?" Jemaine finally answered, looking over at Bret.

"You hungry?" Bret asked.

"Um...yeah, I guess," Jemaine said.

"I was thinking of going out to get us some Chinese or something," Bret said, "that sound alright?"

"Yeah, fine," Jemaine answered, not sounding like he cared one way or the other.

"K," Bret said, "I'll be back soon."

"OK," Jemaine said, turning to face the television again, expression inscrutable.

Bret tried not to worry about his friend, but couldn't help sneaking a glance back at him as he left the apartment.

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

Jemaine sat miserably on the couch, barely paying attention to the game show on TV. Now that the adrenaline from his earlier panic had worn off, his left hand throbbed painfully. 

The doctor had told him he could take aspirin if it started to hurt badly, but Jemaine preferred to just leave it alone. It did serve as a minor distraction from his relentless Bret-centric thoughts, after all.

Jemaine had come to a decision today. He'd realized that under no circumstances could he live without Bret. That left him with only one option in the tell-Bret-or-don't-tell-Bret scenario he'd been endlessly playing out in his mind for weeks. 

As much as it hurt, he knew had to keep this to himself and try to get over it by any means necessary in order to preserve their friendship.

If he told Bret about it, yes, there was an outside chance Bret might feel the same way, but it was much more likely that he didn't. He knew Bret loved him, of course, but not in the way Jemaine wanted. Nobody ever loved Jemaine that way. Why should Bret be any different? Besides, Bret didn't like men. And even if he did, he could probably do much better than Jemaine.

Jemaine didn't think he could handle having his heart broken by the one person he cared the most about in the world, and he knew he couldn't handle the possibility of Bret freaking out and not wanting to be friends with him any more. 

After tonight, things would be different. They would have to be. For the sake of the friendship, the band, and Jemaine's sanity.

 

\---------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bret returned with the Chinese food to find Jemaine hadn't moved from his spot on the couch. Bret got them each a fork from the cutlery drawer (knowing that Jemaine would likely not want to fiddle around with chopsticks with one hand not working properly at the moment) and set the food down on the table in front of Jemaine. 

Bret opened the bag, grabbed a box and plunked himself down on the other end of the couch. After a moment, Jemaine rooted through the bag, found something to his liking, and began to eat.

"Thanks for getting food, mate," Jemaine said, his mouth full of sweet and sour pork.

"No problem," Bret answered, digging in. Why did food always taste so much better when you were hungry?

They ate the rest of their meal in silence, and once they were done, Bret gathered the detritus and brought it into the kitchen to throw the containers away and put the leftovers in the fridge.

He turned away from the fridge to find Jemaine standing, uncomfortably, a few feet behind him.

"Bret," Jemaine began.

"Yeah," Bret replied.

"About today..." Jemaine continued, "you...well, you pretty much saved my life. I...I don't know what I would have done if you hadn't been there. So...um...yeah."

Bret watched Jemaine turned a bit red, and stifled a smile at the extreme awkwardness of Jemaine's attempt to thank him.

"Anytime, man." Bret said.

They stood there for a second, neither moving or saying anything, then Jemaine stepped closer to Bret and slowly and awkwardly put his arms around him. Bret returned the hug, surprised that Jemaine was initiating physical contact but not about to complain.

The hug went on for a few seconds. Then a bit longer. Then much longer than a normal hug should.

Jemaine's breath felt hot on Bret's neck and Bret found himself wildly hoping that Jemaine would kiss him again. Hell, if this went on for much longer, Bret might just throw caution to the wind and kiss Jemaine.

Bret was finding it a bit hard to breathe, however, and was going to have to move soon.

"Um...Jemaine...?" Bret said, quietly, realizing with a bit of a jolt that he was probably going to kiss Jemaine as soon as his friend's head lifted from his shoulder. 

Jemaine pulled away a bit more rapidly than Bret had expected, however, and had retreated a few feet away from Bret within less than a second.

"Uh...sorry..." Jemaine mumbled, "I think I was starting to fall asleep for a second there...blood loss and stuff...you know."

"It's OK," Bret assured him, and tried to reach for Jemaine's arm, but Jemaine began to walk briskly toward the bedroom.

"I'm gonna go to bed," Jemaine announced as he rounded the corner into the bedroom, "m'really tired." 

Bret followed behind him, "Jemaine, it's barely 9 o'clock," he said, confused.

"I'm just really tired," Jemaine said again, not looking at Bret as he slipped off his shoes and jeans and got into bed wearing just his t-shirt and boxers, "night, Bret."

Bret stood in the archway for a moment, flustered and confused. What had just happened? 

He knew he should probably just leave it but he was sick of doing that. He wanted to talk to Jemaine about this now. 

"Jemaine," Bret said, as he walked to the side of Jemaine's bed.

Jemaine didn't answer, he had the blanket pulled almost completely over his head and was making faint snoring sounds that were obviously fake.

"Jemaine, m'not stupid, I know you're not sleeping," Bret insisted.

This garnered no response from Jemaine.

"Come on, man," Bret pleaded, "I just want to talk to you."

Jemaine continued to snore.

"Whatever," Bret said, defeated, "just forget it."

Bret would just have to wait until tomorrow and hope that Jemaine was in less of a weird frame of mind. 

He sat down to watch TV and tried not to dwell on things too much. Though he couldn't help wishing he'd gotten that kiss.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jemaine attempts to get over his feelings for Bret in his usual emotionally retarded way (which works out just about well as you would expect). Bret is determined to figure out what the flip is going on.

Jemaine heard Bret turn on the TV in the other room and breathed a sigh of relief. He felt like an ass for ignoring Bret when he just wanted to talk, but Jemaine knew he wouldn't have been able to handle it. He needed to be alone. If he had talked to Bret he just would have wound up doing or saying something he might not have been able to take back and he knew he had to be strong in his resolve to get over this in order to preserve their friendship.

He felt like such an idiot. The hug was probably a mistake. He had just wanted to thank Bret for helping him, and the hug had just sort of happened. Maybe that's what it was like for people quitting smoking, Jemaine thought. They just had to have one last drag before throwing away the pack. Of course, Jemaine had let the hug linger much longer than he should have and now Bret probably knew something was up. 

He'd wanted to kiss Bret so badly. They'd been so close. Bret's gentle hands on his back, soft curls against his cheek. The hug had definitely been a mistake. It certainly wasn't going to make getting over Bret any easier.

Jemaine didn't think he'd ever felt more miserable in his life.

Hot tears burned behind his eyes for the second time that day and he pressed his face angrily into his pillow, feeling the lump in his throat grow more and more painful as he stubbornly fought the sobs that were threatening to escape. Jemaine hated to cry. He didn't understand people who said they felt better after having 'a good cry', he'd always just felt weak and ashamed of himself.

He took a few deep breaths and after a minute, the lump started to go away. He turned onto his side, careful not to move his throbbing hand too much. He knew he likely wouldn't be able to fall asleep for hours, but hopefully that would give him time to come up with some sort of plan to get over Bret. 

\------------------------------------------------------------------------

 

"Bret?"

"Yes."

"Jemaine?"

"..."

"Jemaine?"

"..."

"Jemaine!"

"What! Murray, obviously I'm here, I'm sitting right in front of you!" Jemaine snapped. 

"So that's a yes from you then?" Murray asked.

"Yes!"

"Good, and Murray? Present." Murray checked off the names on his agenda and prepared to begin the meeting proper.

"Item one - Jemaine, why do you have a bandage on your hand? Is that some sort of new thing that musicians are wearing to look cool and dangerous?" Murray asked with a conspiratorial grin.

"No," Jemaine answered, gruffly, "I cut my hand on some glass."

"We had to go to the emergency room," Bret added, "he got stitches and everything."

"Stitches! You really should be more careful, Jemaine," Murray advised, "I know you were probably at some crazy rock and roll party, trying to impress all of your cool friends, but glass is dangerous. It's not to be played with."

"I wasn't playing with anything," Jemaine explained, irritated, "I was washing dishes and a glass fell and broke in my hand."

"Oh," Murray said, almost sounding disappointed, "well that's not a very interesting story now is it?"

"Sorry...?" Jemaine replied.

"We should probably tell the fans you hurt yourself in a cooler way," Murray suggested, "like punching a TV or something."

"That's stupid. Why would I punch a TV?" Jemaine asked.

"Because that's the sort of stuff that rock stars do, Jemaine!" Murray explained, "They're wild! Unpredictable! You want the fans to think 'Oh, that Jemaine...you never know what he's going to do next...mmm... he's so dangerous...and...sexy!', right?"

"Whatever, Murray, I don't really care what Mel thinks of me," Jemaine grumbled.

"Well you won't win any new fans with that attitude..." Murray added.

"Do we have any gigs, Murray?" Bret changed the subject.

"We'll get to that, Bret," Murray assured him, "One item at a time! OK... I guess we're finished with item one, so item two: gigs; still working on that, none at the moment...."

"Why not, Murray?" Bret asked, "You haven't gotten us anything in weeks. The last gig we had was at that retirement home. Remember? When we killed that old man?"

"You didn't kill him, Bret," Murray reassured him, "the home said he died of heart failure. It could have happened at anytime."

"Yeah, but it happened while he was trying to dance to one of our songs," Jemaine added.

"Poor guy..." Bret said, looking down sadly.

"Anyway, sorry," Murray said, "I've been trying, but no luck yet getting any more gigs."

"Doesn't really matter anyway," Jemaine said, "I can't play for a week or so with my hand like this."

"You can't play?" Murray asked, "when you were going to tell me about this?"

"I thought it was sort of obvious," Jemaine answered, holding up his bandaged hand, "we don't have any gigs anyway so..."

"As band manager, I need to be informed when one of the band members is out of commission!" Murray exclaimed.

"Well I'm informing you now!" Jemaine snapped.

"What if we'd had a gig?" Murray asked.

"Well, we don't," Jemaine said.

"Well, we could have!" Murray argued.

"Unlikely," Jemaine said, under his breath.

Murray finally gave up and they moved on to item three: Hats? Should the band wear them?

Bret found himself paying little attention to the rest of the meeting as it was difficult to focus on anything other than Jemaine and his bad mood. What the flip was going on with him anyway? 

\-----------------------------------------------------------------

Jemaine scowled and picked over the burger Bret had brought home for him. He didn't feel much like eating for some reason.

"Jemaine," Bret began, noticing his roommate's sullen expression, "what's up with you?"

"Nothing's up with me," Jemaine replied, defensively, and took a bite of his burger as if to prove a point.

"You're acting really grumpy," Bret pointed out.

"No I'm not," Jemaine argued.

"Yeah, you are," Bret insisted, "you have been for days now."

"Whatever," Jemaine said, and took another bite of his burger. If he had his mouth full, maybe Bret would stop expecting him to respond to questions.

"Are you mad we don't have any gigs?" Bret asked.

"No."

"Did I do something to annoy you?"

"No."

"Is it because I used all the hot water this morning?"

"No."

"Is it because I made you turn off that really sad program you were watching about those abandoned pets?"

"No."

"Am I asking too many questions?"

"Kinda."

"Is it your hand? Does your hand hurt?"

"Yeah...yes, that's it, my hand hurts," Jemaine lied, figuring it would get Bret off his back.

"Oh," Bret said, and he rose from the table and headed into the bathroom.

He returned a moment later with two aspirins and a glass of water which he handed to Jemaine then sat back down to finish his meal.

Jemaine wordlessly took the pills and swallowed them, feeling a little guilty for being short with Bret. Bret hadn't done anything. He was just trying to be a good friend.

Jemaine didn't know how he was supposed to do this. He was trying to act aloof. More like he had before he realized he was in love with Bret and before he had started being extra-nice to him. But it wasn't easy and so far it hadn't accomplished much besides putting him in a bad mood and confusing Bret. He couldn't turn back entirely, then he'd be right back where he'd started, but he'd have to maybe tone things down a bit and move on to phase two of his plan.

\----------------------------------------------------------------------

The next few weeks were some of the most confusing and frustrating weeks in Bret's life. He had just figured out his own feelings for Jemaine and had finally been starting to think that maybe Jemaine liked him 'that way' too, when Jemaine pulled a complete one-eighty.

He was in a near constant bad mood and wasn't being nice to Bret anymore - sometimes he seemed almost mean - and he wouldn't really talk to Bret about much of anything. Bret's attempts to draw him out resulted, at best, in Jemaine ignoring him or stubbornly changing the subject, and at worst actually snapping at Bret to leave him alone.

Jemaine hadn't even let Bret help him out in the days after he first hurt his hand. He'd insisted on changing the bandage himself, which took forever, and he even refused Bret's offer to go with him when he got his stitches out. He had gotten Murray to take him while Bret was at work. When Bret had confronted him about this Jemaine had said it was because he hadn't felt like taking the bus and Murray had a car, but Bret wasn't so sure that was the only reason.

Jemaine seemed to not want to be around Bret much at all. If Bret sat beside him on the couch, Jemaine would move to the armchair. If Bret wanted to go out somewhere in the evening and invited Jemaine to come along, Jemaine would tell him he had a date.

Oh, that was the other thing. Jemaine had a girlfriend now. One day, shortly after he got his stitches out, Jemaine had come home and announced that Dave had set him up with a pretty girl named Alexis and that they were going on a date that night.

Bret got an ache in the pit of his stomach at this news, but tried to be happy for Jemaine - or at least pretend to be. Jemaine had come home later that night and told Bret all about the awesome date he'd been on and how great Alexis was. Every word had stung but Bret had listened intently as this had been the most Jemaine had spoken to him in a week.

Jemaine and Alexis seemed to be going on quite a lot of dates. At least a few times a week whenever Bret would suggest he and Jemaine do something together, Jemaine would tell him he was sorry but he had plans with Alexis that night.

Whenever Bret suggested Jemaine invite Alexis to the apartment, Jemaine would make up some excuse as to why he couldn't (she had a phobia of stairs and elevators, she was allergic to mold...). Bret had tried once to invite himself on one of their dates (Jemaine used to do that to him all the time, after all) and Jemaine had said that Alexis was terrified of people with beards, something about a bad experience with a department store Santa Claus. Alexis sounded like a strange girl.

After awhile, Bret had come to the conclusion that he must have done something terrible to upset Jemaine. Something so awful that Jemaine couldn't even talk to him about it and felt the need to avoid Bret entirely. Bret wracked his brain but couldn't think of anything he might have done. He wondered briefly if it had been because he'd kissed Jemaine but that didn't make much sense. Jemaine had kissed him first, after all. Besides, Jemaine hadn't really started to avoid him until a day or two later.

Bret was determined to get to the bottom of this. If he could ever get Jemaine to have a proper conversation with him, that is.

\-----------------------------------------------------------------------

"And she was fucking STACKED, you know what I mean? I'm talking tits you could literally get lost in!" Dave was currently regaling Bret with a story about a woman he'd met recently. Bret nodded politely. He had come by the store after work to get a tea and, since Dave was just about to close up anyway, he had joined Bret outside and they had got to chatting.

"She sounds pretty awesome," Bret said.

"Yeah, she was alright..." Dave said with a shrug, "so where's your other half today?"

"Who?" Bret asked, "Oh, you mean Jemaine?"

"Obviously."

"I was just coming home from work," Bret explained, "I think Jemaine has a date tonight or something."

"Really?" Dave said, incredulously, "a date?"

"Yeah," Bret continued, "with that girl, Alexis. He said you set him up with her?"

"What!?" Dave exclaimed, "he's so full of shit! He definitely doesn't have a date with Alexis."

"Well, that's what he said," Bret replied, puzzled, "how do you know, anyway?"

"I know because Alexis came in here over a week ago to say goodbye to me," Dave explained, "she was moving to Vegas with her new fiance."

"But...he told me he had a date with her..." Bret was thoroughly confused now, "he's gone out with her like 10 times already."

"Well, he's a fucking liar," Dave said.

"So...you didn't set her up with him?" Bret asked.

"No, I did," Dave clarified, "Jemaine came in here a few weeks ago, acting all morose and shit, and he was like 'Dave! You've got to help me! I need to get over someone! How do I do it!', so I told him that the best way to get over someone is to get someone new under you! So he asked if I knew anyone, and, since he was acting like such an enormous fucking vagina, I took pity on him and set him up with Alexis. She and I went out a few times but she wasn't really hot enough for me. More than hot enough for Jemaine though - pretty easy too."

"Oh, so they did go out," Bret said.

"Yeah, once," Dave explained, "Alexis came in here a couple of days later asking why I set her up with someone so fucking boring. She said he was all distracted and barely said two words to her all night, so she told him she didn't want to see him again."

"Hmm," Bret said, "that's weird. Did he tell you who he was trying to get over?"

"No," Dave said, "he didn't say, and I don't fucking care so I didn't ask."

"He hasn't had a girlfriend in forever," Bret continued, "and he never told me about any of this."

"I can't believe you didn't know!" Dave said, almost laughing at the absurdity, "you two are fucking joined at the hip!"

"I don't know, Jemaine's been acting kinda weird lately," Bret admitted, "he's not really talking to me about anything."

"Sounds to me like trouble in paradise..." Dave suggested, sagely.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Bret asked.

"Oh come on, you know what I'm talking about," Dave said, an incredulous look on his face, "you Norwegian motherfuckers are so gay for each other it's not even funny. OK, well it is a little funny," Dave chuckled.

"What?" Bret said, surprised, "no...Jemaine and me...we're not like that."

"Whatever you say, dude," Dave said, tone of disbelief in his voice, "all I know is that the way Jemaine was acting when he came in here a few weeks ago? He only acts that way when you two are fighting or when you somehow manage to find yourself a girlfriend."

"I don't think so, man," Bret said, "Jemaine's been avoiding me lately, he's actually been kinda mean. I would think he'd be nicer if he...you know...liked me."

"What can I say, man, love is fucked up," Dave concluded.

"I guess," Bret conceded, "look, I gotta go. Thanks for the tea."

"Whatever," Dave answered as Bret got up and began the short walk back to the apartment. 

That was it. Not only was Jemaine being a jerk to him, he was lying to him too? Bret wasn't going to let this go for one more day. As soon as he got home, he was going to make Jemaine tell him what was going on.

\------------------------------------------------------------------

Bret had spent the walk home thinking of things to say to Jemaine, and preparing himself for a possible fight. But he was ready. This had gone on long enough. 

"Jemaine! I need to talk to you!" Bret announced, forcefully, as he opened the door...to an empty apartment.

Flip, Jemaine had said he was going out tonight. Where exactly he had gone was a mystery, as he definitely wasn't on a date with Alexis.

Bret decided he would try to call Jemaine, but put down the phone when he noticed Jemaine's camera-phone sitting on the kitchen table.

Oh well, Bret thought, he would just wait for Jemaine to get back and then confront him. Resolve hardened, Bret sat down on the couch to watch some TV and wait.

He waited. And waited. And waited some more. 

Finally, after dozing off for the third time during the Ronco Food Dehydrator infomercial, Bret reluctantly gave up and went to bed. He'd just have to confront Jemaine in the morning.

He fell asleep and had a terrible dream. Jemaine walked into the room and began kissing him passionately, but when Bret had tried to kiss him back Jemaine had recoiled, asking what he thought he was doing. Jemaine said he didn't want him, and that he was leaving. Bret had pleaded with him to stay but Jemaine wouldn't listen. He had left the apartment (taking Maisie with him - who had inexplicably been in the apartment too - she gave Bret as dirty a look as a dog can give before turning her back on him and following Jemaine out of the apartment). Bret had tried to follow them, but as soon as he stepped out of the apartment he found himself in the middle of a scorching desert, nobody around for miles. He tried to yell for Jemaine but his voice wouldn't work. Bret began gasping for breath and, as he collapsed onto the sand feeling like he might die...

...a pillow hit him in the face and he awoke with a start.

\-----------------------------------------------------------------

 

Jemaine breathed a sigh of relief when he came home to find all of the lights off in the apartment. Bret would already be in bed so Jemaine could quietly get into his own bed without having to worry about any awkward conversations.

Jemaine had gone to see a movie on his 'date', and after it was finished, he had gone to a coffee shop and nursed a cup of tea for awhile until he figured it would be safe to head home.

He felt bad about lying to Bret about Alexis (and he really was planning to tell him they broke up - after he got over Bret, of course), but he had to keep it up for now. He just couldn't trust himself to be alone with Bret. Jemaine lived in constant fear of saying or doing something that might let Bret on to how he felt and he couldn't let that happen. It was just easier to avoid Bret as much as possible while he tried to sort out his feelings.

Unfortunately, he hadn't begun to feel any different yet. If anything, it was almost worse because, in addition to being in love with Bret, he sort of missed him now too. But Jemaine was determined to tough it out.

Jemaine quietly stepped out of his jeans and shoes and put on an old t-shirt. He looked over at Bret who seemed to be thrashing around a bit. That was odd. Maybe he was having a dream? 

Jemaine got into bed and was just about to remove his glasses and lay down when he heard Bret begin to whimper and moan from across the room. 

Bret was definitely dreaming. Jemaine wondered absently if it was a sex dream. It sort of sounded like it. He felt a smile tug at the corner of his mouth, and couldn't stop himself from watching Bret for a moment, feeling like a bit of a voyeur. 

After a minute, Bret still had not let up so Jemaine figured he should probably wake him up. Bret might be having a nightmare for all Jemaine knew. Plus, Jemaine knew he would never get to sleep if he had to listen to Bret moaning like that all night.

"Bret...wake up! Bret!...BRET!" Jemaine called out. Bret didn't respond at all.

Crap, Jemaine thought. He really didn't want to get up to wake Bret. Part of his plan had been to avoid physical contact with Bret as much as he possibly could. Jemaine looked around. He supposed he could throw a pillow at him...it wouldn't hurt Bret but should wake him up. Jemaine realized that it probably wasn't the nicest way to rouse someone, but it wasn't anything that the old 'just-friends' Jemaine wouldn't do. 

Bret continued to moan so Jemaine picked up his smallest, lightest pillow, and tossed it as gently as he could toward Bret's head.

The pillow hit Bret squarely in the face. He immediately stopped moaning and sat up in bed, the pillow falling to his lap. He seemed confused for a moment then saw the pillow and looked over at Jemaine. 

"Why'd you throw a pillow at me, you dickhead!" Bret exclaimed, throwing the pillow back at Jemaine with as much force as he could muster.

"Augh! Hey!" Jemaine was shocked at Bret's outburst, "you were moaning in your sleep so I thought I should wake you up! You're welcome, by the way."

"There are better ways to wake a person up than throwing a pillow at their face!" Bret continued, angrily.

"Maybe, but it worked, didn't it?" Jemaine countered, lamely.

"What the flip is the matter with you anyway?!" Bret seemed to be on a roll.

"What are you talking about?" Jemaine answered.

"You know exactly what I'm talking about," Bret said, not having any intention of letting Jemaine talk his way out of this one, "you've been a complete asshole to me lately!"

Jemaine was shocked at Bret's language, but realized he probably deserved it. He had been a bit of a jerk, now that he thought about it.

"Well, I'm sorry." Jemaine said, meaning it, but not sounding very sincere.

"What's the problem? Why can't you just tell me?" Bret asked, frustrated beyond belief.

"There is no problem so there's nothing to tell!" Jemaine lied.

"Did you have fun on your date, by the way?" Bret asked, venomously.

"Yeah...yeah, it was great," Jemaine replied, uneasily.

"That's funny," Bret countered, "because you didn't have a date tonight!" 

"Yes I did!" Jemaine was starting to feel a bit sick, "wait, how do you know that?"

"Dave told me!" Bret continued, "he said you went on one date with that girl, she didn't want to see you again, and besides, she doesn't even live in New York anymore!"

"What?" Jemaine said, "really?"

"Just...please stop acting like you don't know what I'm talking about," Bret said, his anger beginning to fade but the frustration and confusion still in full force. "It's bad enough that you barely talk to me anymore, but now you're lying just so you don't have to spend time with me? What did I do, Jemaine? What did I do?"

Jemaine's heart sank. He was such an idiot. He had no idea his plan to get over Bret was actually hurting Bret. That was the last thing he'd ever wanted to do.

"Well I've tried to figure it out but I can't," Bret said, voice cracking a little, "I just wish you'd tell me what it was that made you so angry with me so I can fix it and things can go back to normal."

Jemaine looked at Bret, whose brown eyes were filling with tears, and felt like the most horrible human being on the planet. For nearly a full minute he couldn't even speak. What had he done?

"Just forget it," Bret said quietly, and laid back down, facing away from Jemaine.

Jemaine immediately got up and went to Bret's bedside, no longer caring about the plan. He'd made Bret cry. He had to fix this.

"Bret!" Jemaine knelt on the floor by the head of Bret's bed, "Bret, I'm sorry! Please, just let me explain."

"Go away, Jemaine," Bret said, voice muffled by blankets.

"No," Jemaine said, and put a hand on Bret's arm, "I'm sorry, Bret, I'm so sorry... You didn't do anything, OK? I promise. This is all me, I'm...I'm just really messed up right now. And I had no idea... I never ever wanted to hurt you. And now I've screwed everything up..." 

Bret turned over to look at Jemaine, his eyes red but dry, "so why have you been avoiding me lately? Why have you been lying to me?"

"Because, I..." Jemaine began, voice sounding huskier than usual, "just...stuff, I can't tell you..."

"Why not!?" Bret asked, "I'm your best friend, man! If you can't tell me, who can you tell? What are you afraid of?"

"M'afraid that..." Jemaine could barely speak, he knew then that the plan was done with, he couldn't keep lying to Bret and to himself, something had to give, "I'm afraid that you won't want to be my friend anymore."

"Jemaine..." Bret continued, voice softening, "why would you think that?"

"Because it's...it's weird and you'll think I'm weird and...I just ruin everything..." Jemaine explained, miserably.

"Please, Jemaine," Bret coaxed, putting a hand over Jemaine's, "just tell me, I promise that whatever it is, I'll still be your friend."

Jemaine took a deep breath, "I just...I want...I need..." Jemaine wanted to spill everything. Wanted to tell Bret how he thought about him every second of every day. How much he wanted to be with him. How much he loved him. But it was too much. He couldn't say all of those things. Not yet. 

"What..." Bret said softly, "what do you need, Jemaine?"

"I need...I need to..." Jemaine couldn't help himself. He couldn't wait for one more second. He took Bret's face in his hands and kissed him, first chastely, then a second time with a bit more vigor. 

Jemaine moved back a bit and searched Bret's face. His expression was unreadable. Jemaine felt that pit in his stomach again and he began to rise from the floor. He'd screwed everything up again. "Sorry, Bret..." Jemaine babbled, "m'sorry...I'm an idiot..."

"Jemaine..." Bret sat up in bed.

"I don't know what's wrong with me..." Jemaine stood and started to turn away from Bret, not able to look at him.

"Jemaine!"

"What?" Jemaine asked, miserably as he felt Bret grab his arm. He turned around.

"Shut up."

Bret pulled Jemaine roughly onto the bed and kissed him deeply. Jemaine moved away after a few seconds, breathing heavily and looking at Bret with wonder. 

"Did you just...did you really just...?" Jemaine was still incapable of forming actual sentences.

"Yes," Bret breathed, voice tinged with lust, "and I'm going to do it again if that's alright with you."

Jemaine just nodded, eagerly and they fell back onto the bed together. Their lips came together again with an almost bruising intensity, Bret teased Jemaine's lips with his tongue and Jemaine opened his mouth a little to allow Bret access. 

Bret wove his fingers into Jemaine's hair and pressed their faces together as close as they would go, like he was trying to devour him.

Jemaine moaned helplessly into Bret's mouth as his hands moved up Bret's back, loving the feel of the curls at the nape of his friend's neck.

Jemaine could hardly believe how worked up he was. He'd never gotten this aroused from just a few minutes of kissing before. God, Bret was good at this.

Bret moved his hands from Jemaine's hair, slowly down his back, until he was tightly grabbing Jemaine's incredible ass through his boxers.

Jemaine thrust forward, reflexively at this and cried out as he met Bret's pajama-clad erection with his own. Jemaine began to move away, not quite sure if this was OK, but Bret quickly answered that for him by thrusting back against Jemaine.

"Oh, Bret..." Jemaine moaned, moving his mouth away from Bret's momentarily. He couldn't believe this was actually happening. Jemaine, his hands now buried in Bret's wonderful curls, pulled Bret to him again and they shared another deep, knee weakening kiss as they continued to thrust against each other wildly, Bret pulling Jemaine closer to him every time. 

Jemaine could feel his orgasm building and he started to move his face away from Bret's. Bret took one hand off of Jemaine's backside just long enough to lift Jemaine's chin until their lips were aligned again.

"No...stay here..." Bret breathed.

Jemaine wasn't about to protest. They continued their frantic exploration of each other's mouths, breathing and moaning together, hips thrusting madly with nothing but thin fabric between them, until they both came with surprising intensity, Bret just seconds after Jemaine.

Jemaine, utterly spent, groped his arms around Bret's back and held him tightly, not wanting to ever let go. Bret moved his hands up and stroked Jemaine's back gently. Neither of them felt the need to speak. Jemaine had his face nuzzled against Bret's neck and he drank in the scent of him and listened to Bret's breathing as it gradually slowed from loud panting to slow, soft, almost inaudible breaths.

Bret had fallen asleep. Jemaine smiled, and gently shifted until he was lying on his back with his arms still around his friend, Bret's head resting on Jemaine's chest.

Even though his heart felt close to bursting, Jemaine managed to fall asleep quite quickly. It was the best sleep he'd had in months.


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bret and Jemaine are finally together, but their predictable lack of communication is causing some problems.

Jemaine awoke the next morning with an unfamiliar weight pressing against his chest. After a second, he remembered it was Bret and smiled, burying his nose in Bret's mess of curls. 

Jemaine tried to be as still as possible so as not to wake Bret. Last night felt almost like a dream. What if, when Bret woke up, things got weird? What if Bret regretted what they had done?

Jemaine's worries were put to rest quite quickly when Bret awoke, stretched a bit, then turned his head to look up at Jemaine.

"Morning," Bret said, eyes half closed but with a smile on his face.

“Morning,” Jemaine replied, trying not to let his relief show in his face.

"Did you sleep OK?" Bret asked, fingers tracing lazily along Jemaine's stomach.

"Yeah, great actually," Jemaine answered, "best I've slept in months, I think."

"Me too. You're pretty comfy," Bret remarked, then, pulling away from Jemaine a bit, "Euch, I need a shower, I'll probably need a chisel to get myself out of these pants."

Jemaine chuckled at this. They really should have made some effort to clean themselves up the night before, but the thought hadn't occurred to either of them at the time.

Bret climbed over Jemaine, giving him a quick kiss in the process, then made his way into the bathroom.

Jemaine couldn't stifle the goofy grin that spread across his face as he settled back onto Bret's pillow. They had done...things. Sexy things. And Bret had been into it! Jemaine found himself wishing he hadn't wasted all of that time keeping his feelings a secret from Bret. How long had Bret felt the same way?

Jemaine thought about how distant he had been with Bret over the past weeks – how mean he had been – and felt almost sick with guilt. He would make it up to Bret. In whatever way he could. Now that he had Bret he was determined not to lose him.

The bathroom door opened, and Bret stepped out, a towel wrapped around his waist. "Shower's free," he announced, as he went over to the dresser to pick out some clothes.

Jemaine gazed at Bret for a moment while Bret had his back to him, watching as a few stray water droplets fell from Bret's wet hair and traced slowly down his back. Jemaine got up from the bed, fighting back the urge to rip Bret's towel off, throw him on the bed, and have his way with him (he knew if he did they'd never get anything done that day), and instead just offered Bret an awkward "thanks" and hurried into the bathroom.

Jemaine managed to extricate himself from his boxers and stepped into the hot spray of the shower. He found himself thinking about the previous night, how wonderful it felt to be kissing Bret, grinding against him, making him come. Jemaine jerked off to the memory and came hard and fast, biting his lip to keep from crying out. 

Once he had finished up, he quickly got dressed and exited the bathroom, planning to begin making things up to Bret by making him an elaborate breakfast.

He entered the kitchen, however, to find Bret already standing over the stove, frying up some eggs and bacon.

Bret turned to look at him and smiled, "Hey, man. I'm making breakfast. Sit down, it's almost ready."

"Aww, Bret," Jemaine said, disappointed, as he sank into one of the chairs, "you didn't have to do that!"

"I know, but I wanted to," Bret shrugged as he transferred the contents of the pan to two plates, "what's the big deal?"

"It's just that..." Jemaine began as Bret set the plate down in front of him and moved to grab the orange juice out of the fridge, "I wanted to make breakfast for you..."

"OK, you can make breakfast tomorrow then," Bret suggested, pouring Jemaine some juice then sitting down in the chair opposite him.

"I don't deserve to have breakfast made for me," Jemaine mumbled quietly.

"Jemaine," Bret said taking a bite of bacon, "what are you talking about?"

"It's just...I've been such a bastard to you lately, and now you're being nice to me, and I don't deserve it. I don't deserve you," Jemaine explained, miserably.

Bret sighed and moved to sit in the chair beside Jemaine.

Jemaine continued, quietly, "I'm so sorry, Bret. I can't even begin to tell you how sorry I am. I'd do anything to take it all back. I never wanted to hurt you, ever."

"I know that," Bret said, taking Jemaine's hand, "and yeah, it did hurt that you were ignoring me and lying to me, and I was really angry. But now that I know the reasons you were acting that way I can't stay mad at you. I know you'd never hurt me like that on purpose. And I know that you were hurting too."

"I'm sorry," Jemaine repeated, voice husky, finally looking into Bret's eyes.

"I know you are, and I forgive you," Bret said, pulling Jemaine into a hug, Jemaine wrapping his arms around Bret, gratefully. "But if you ever do anything like that again don't expect to get off this lightly," Bret added, playfully.

Jemaine smiled a bit and they broke apart from the hug.

"I'm serious," Bret continued, "I'm talking weeks...maybe even months...of indentured servitude."

"That might not be so bad..." Jemaine replied, sheepishly.

Bret just laughed and shoved him a little, then went back to finish his breakfast.

They sat in silence for awhile, enjoying their eggs and bacon, when Bret noticed that Jemaine kept staring at him with a strange look in his eye.

"What?" Bret asked, "do I have food on my face or something?" He began wiping at his beard with his hands.

"No...no...it's not that," Jemaine replied, looking away.

"What is it then?" Bret asked.

"It's just..." Jemaine began, face turning red, "you...youlookhotinthatshirt."

"What did you say?"

Jemaine tried to look away again, but Bret wouldn't stop staring at him so he relented, "I said, you look hot in that shirt."

"What, this?" Bret looked down at his shirt, it was the one with the unicorn on it that he'd gotten from Dave's shop. "I thought you hated this shirt."

"Well," Jemaine began, "the unicorn is kinda silly, but the shirt is...you know...really tight and stuff and it shows off...nevermind." Jemaine suddenly wished there was a hole in the floor he could crawl into.

Bret managed not to laugh but couldn't stop himself from grinning widely at Jemaine. They sat quietly and ate their breakfast. Bret finished first and couldn't resist puffing his chest out a bit then pointedly rolling up his sleeves for Jemaine's benefit.

"Come on, Bret, stop it," Jemaine finally said, rising to collect the dishes from the table, "I'm embarrassed enough as it is."

"OK, I'm sorry," Bret said, still smiling and turning around in his chair as Jemaine began to wash the dishes, "it's just kinda funny, is all."

Bret, seeing that Jemaine was not quite as amused as he himself was, rolled his shirtsleeves back down and went to stand beside Jemaine at the sink.

"Hey, Jemaine," Bret began.

"What?" Jemaine asked, still looking quite flustered.

"Your arse looks hot in those jeans."

"Really?" Jemaine asked after a second, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

"Mmhmm," Bret confirmed, nodding.

Jemaine quickly dried his hands on the dishtowel next to the sink, not caring that he was leaving most of the dishes unwashed, then reached up to cup Bret's smiling face in his hands, pulling him close then kissing him deeply. 

Bret responded with gusto, taking Jemaine's lower lip into his mouth and sucking it until Jemaine was sure his legs were about to give way. They broke apart after a minute, both breathing heavily.

They looked at each other, feeling a bit awkward, but not uncomfortably so. Even wrapped in such familiar packaging, the dynamic between them was already feeling quite different. It was exciting, but it would take some getting used to.

"Um..." Jemaine started after a moment, bringing a hand up to scratch his head, absently, "I was thinking, maybe we should go to the laundromat. I have some stuff that needs washing and we can throw in your sheets and pyjamas..."

"Good idea," Bret agreed. 

They busied themselves with collecting whatever dirty laundry they could find, then made their way out of the apartment and headed towards the laundromat.

\-----------------------------------------

As they sat watching their clothing go round and round in the washer, Bret found himself thinking how strange it was that so much could change in a day. Just yesterday he was confused about Jemaine's feelings for him - thought Jemaine hated him, in fact - and today, here they were sitting in the laundromat, washing away the evidence of a sexy night together.

Bret moved his leg over to brush against Jemaine's knee. Jemaine reciprocated, bumping his leg against Bret's a bit more obviously. They looked at each other and smiled.

Jemaine took a quick glance around the laundromat. It was fairly early in the morning on a weekday so the only other person there was an old man sitting off in a far corner engrossed in a book of sudoku puzzles.

"Hey Bret," Jemaine whispered, conspiratorially.

"Yeah?" 

"C'mon, I want to show you something," Jemaine got up and motioned for Bret to follow him.

Bret watched as Jemaine disappeared behind a machine at the back of the laundromat. Bret followed and wound up at the entrance to a short, dark hallway that contained a broken washer and a few empty boxes.

"Jemaine?" Bret called out, not seeing him anywhere.

All of a sudden Jemaine reached out from behind the door frame, pulled Bret into the hallway, pressed him up against the wall and gave him a deep, knee-weakening kiss. 

"Mmm..." Bret said, when he could breathe again, "that was...that was hot..."

"Yeah?" Jemaine asked, raising his eyebrows, a wicked grin on his face. "How about this?"

Jemaine then brought his lips to Bret's throat, kissing and licking his way up to Bret's earlobe, sucking and biting as his hands found their way under Bret's shirt and moved deftly across his chest.

Bret moaned as quietly as he could (which wasn't really that quietly at all) as Jemaine's hands and mouth continued to undo him. "Aaah...mmm....Jem...Jemaine...maybe we shouldn't....unh...maybe we shouldn't do this here..." Bret suggested, not really wanting to stop but thinking that they probably should for that very reason. 

"Why?" Jemaine asked, between kisses, "nobody's gonna see us."

"Yeah," Bret agreed, "you're probably right." He reached his hands down to grab Jemaine's ass and pulled him closer, feeling Jemaine's arousal against his own.

Jemaine brought his mouth back up to Bret's and they kissed again, tongues and teeth clashing inexpertly, but what they lacked in technique they more than made up for in enthusiasm.

Jemaine had just reached his hand in between them and begun to work his way under the waistband of Bret's pants, when suddenly a door at the end of the hall opened and a large, greasy looking man flipped a switch, flooding the hallway with light. 

Bret and Jemaine broke apart quicker than they could have thought possible just seconds before.

"Um...yeah..." Jemaine stammered, trying to ignore the puzzled stares of the man at the end of the short hallway, "see, I told you this machine wasn't working..." he banged lightly on the broken washing machine as if to emphasize his point.

"Oh, I guess you're right..." Bret added, lamely, and they both turned and went back from where they had come, trying to act casual but moving at a speed several notches up from that.

Noticing that their wash was done when they returned to where they had been sitting before, they quickly transferred the clothes into a dryer and made their way outside, deciding that the coffee shop across the street might be a better place to wait. 

And, despite the fact that they had both been left horny as hell, as they sat, sipping their drinks, neither of them could get the silly grins off their faces.

\-----------------------------------------------------

Over the next couple of weeks things progressed between them. They went out to dinner a few times, playfully arguing about who should pay (not that it mattered, as they shared a bank account, but it was the principle of the thing), and their nights were mainly spent snuggling on the couch, which, to Jemaine's surprise, he found he liked quite a lot.

They hadn't gone too far in terms of physical intimacy, things hadn't moved much past making out and awkward (but still incredibly hot) hand jobs, but they were certainly enjoying themselves.

They were having fun together, however, as the days went by, they both began to worry separately about how things were going.

Bret was growing more and more bothered by the fact that they hadn't yet had an actual conversation about their relationship and where it was going. He loved Jemaine, and was fairly certain that Jemaine loved him, but if that was the case, how come Jemaine always changed the subject or (more often) just started making out with him any time Bret tried to initiate a conversation about where things stood? Up until now, Bret had let this slide - he was only human, after all, and Jemaine could get him worked up like nobody else - but it was getting to the point where he was going to have to insist they talk, Jemaine's persuasiveness be damned.

As for Jemaine, he had gotten it into his head that Bret was far too good for him, and that soon, Bret would realize this and not want to be with him anymore. Jemaine knew that Bret wanted to talk about where things were going, but it freaked Jemaine out so badly that he found himself using sex to get out of the conversation. Sex was easy, it was the emotional, relationship stuff that Jemaine had always had problems with in the past. Of course, a relationship was definitely what he wanted with Bret - and he was pretty sure that's what this was - but it was almost as though he thought talking about it would make it real, and if it was real, it could be taken away. And Jemaine knew he couldn't handle that. He loved Bret more than he'd ever loved anyone. If he couldn't be with Bret, he didn't know what he would do. Jemaine much preferred to continue on as they were, hoping that things would just work out on their own.

They went on this way until everything finally came to a head one night about three weeks after their first night together.

\-------------------------------------------------------

Jemaine paced around the apartment, unable to sit still as he watched the clock and waited for Bret to come home from work. Tonight would be the night, he had decided. He wanted Bret so badly, wanted so much to do more than they had been doing. Jemaine wanted to make Bret feel better than he ever had before. 

Jemaine had gotten dressed in a shirt he knew Bret liked, and his jeans that he felt showed off his ass the best (Bret seemed to like it so much, after all), then turned off all of the lights and lit the bedroom with a few candles. This was going to be a night to remember.

Right on time, the door opened and Jemaine heard Bret enter the apartment.

"Jemaine?" Bret called, seeing that his surroundings were mostly dark.

Jemaine rounded the corner from the bedroom and moved swiftly towards the kitchen to meet Bret, sweeping him up in a kiss without so much as a greeting.

"Mmm," Bret moaned, putting his arms around Jemaine's neck, "well, hello to you too..."

"Come on," Jemaine coaxed, taking Bret's hand and leading him into the candlelit bedroom.

"What's all this?" Bret asked, semi-rhetorically, but didn't have a chance to say anything else as Jemaine's mouth was on his again.

Jemaine wasted no time and soon he was lying comfortably on top of Bret as they reclined on Bret's bed, kissing passionately. 

Jemaine's hands entwined themselves in Bret's hair as Bret's hands pulled at the back of Jemaine's shirt. After a moment, Jemaine lifted himself from Bret and removed his shirt, Bret did the same, then reached up to pull Jemaine back down again, loving the feel of Jemaine's bare chest against his. 

Bret reached between them to stroke Jemaine's cock through his jeans. Jemaine's mouth left Bret's for a moment and his breath caught in his throat at the sudden contact. 

As soon as he could convince himself to move again Jemaine shifted away from Bret slightly and removed his pants in record time, he then unbuttoned Bret's jeans and slid those off as well, leaving them both in just their boxers. 

After kissing Bret some more, Jemaine swiftly freed Bret from his boxers, and drank in the sight of him lying, naked and sweaty beneath him. Jemaine leaned down and whispered in Bret's ear, "I'm gonna make you scream."

Bret shivered. This was hot. He was unbelievably turned on, but, in spite of that, he was beginning to feel a little bit freaked out by Jemaine's intensity. However, he couldn't help but be curious as to where Jemaine intended to take things.

Jemaine began to move slowly down Bret's body, raining kisses over his neck, his chest, his belly, his hips then, with barely a pause to allow Bret to catch his breath, Jemaine took Bret's cock into his mouth and began to suck, hungrily.

Bret's head was spinning. On one hand, this was mind-blowing, incredible, exactly what he wanted. Jemaine's unspeakably hot lips wrapped around him, eliciting sensations he never knew he was capable of feeling. But on the other hand, even though he knew that Jemaine had good intentions and was only doing this to make him feel good, he couldn't help but feel that control was being taken from him and it made him a bit uncomfortable, especially since he and Jemaine still hadn't talked things through, and now here Jemaine was, taking things further without even thinking to ask. Bret thought briefly about asking Jemaine to stop, but the part of his brain that was concentrating solely on the feel of Jemaine's tongue licking his shaft, Jemaine's slick mouth sliding over his cock, Jemaine's fingers digging into his thighs, soon took over. Maybe a little loss of control wasn't such a bad thing, Bret thought. 

Bret moaned as Jemaine continued to lick and suck him into oblivion, he was getting close, so close, he felt it only fair to warn Jemaine. Bret reached down and tapped Jemaine on the shoulder, when Jemaine didn't make any effort to move, Bret opened his mouth to speak, "Uh...unh....Jemaine? I'm gonna...think I'm gonna..."

Jemaine finally raised his head, releasing Bret from his mouth, "No...not yet," he panted, a sexy glint in his eye. Jemaine took Bret's cock in his hand now and raised his other hand to his mouth, sucking on his index finger in a way that Bret could only describe as "pornishly". He then reached down between Bret's legs and, ever so gently, brushed his finger against Bret's entrance. Bret gasped at this unexpected contact. It felt good, god did it ever feel good, but he wasn't sure he was ready to take things this far yet. He tried to relax into the sensations of Jemaine's hand pumping his cock and Jemaine's finger teasing his opening, but, as soon as he felt Jemaine begin to slowly push his finger inside, Bret just couldn't relax anymore.

"Jemaine! Stop....just stop!" Bret stammered, not meaning to sound angry, but realizing it probably came across that way anyway. He quickly moved himself away from Jemaine and covered himself with a sheet.

Jemaine sat there for a second looking as though he'd just been slapped, utterly confused as to what had just happened, before moving to sit next to Bret, "Oh, god, Bret, I'm sorry. Did I hurt you?" he asked.

"No. No you didn't hurt me," Bret answered, frantically trying to think of how to articulate what exactly had gone wrong.

"Then what is it?" Jemaine asked, looking horribly worried, putting a hand on Bret's shoulder.

"It's just that," Bret sighed, "I don't know if I'm ready for that yet."

"That's OK," Jemaine assured him, "we don't have to do anything you don't want to."

"I know that," Bret replied, "but...you didn't even ask me."

"Oh crap," Jemaine said, feeling terrible, "I'm sorry, I wasn't thinking. It was just...you just turn me on so much, Bret, I just wanted to make you feel good."

"I know you didn't mean it," Bret continued, "but I wish you would have talked to me first. And it's not just that. We haven't talked about...us...at all since this whole thing started. And every time I try you just kiss me or jerk me off or something. And it's not that I don't like those things, but I need to know where things stand with us. I'm not like you, Jemaine, sex isn't as easy for me as it is for you."

"So you're saying I'm a slut?" Jemaine asked, defensively.

"No, I didn't say that," Bret clarified, "I'm just saying that I need to talk about this stuff more than you do, otherwise I...kinda feel like this whole thing is just about sex and nothing else, you know?"

"Oh, so you think I'm using you?!" Jemaine exclaimed, rising from the bed, "you really think I would do that to you?"

"No, Jemaine...I don't....maybe that came out wrong," Bret stammered, amazed at how things had gone so wrong so quickly, "I'm just saying we need to talk to each other before..." 

"No, I heard you," Jemaine said, voice strained, groping around on the floor for his clothes then nearly falling over after first attempting to put Bret's jeans on instead of his own, "you know what? Nevermind. This whole thing was a bad idea. I...I'm gonna go." Unable to speak anymore, Jemaine walked swiftly out of the bedroom and toward the door of their apartment.

"Jemaine!" Bret called after him, "don't leave! This is never going to work if we don't communicate!"

The door slammed. Bret sat there with his mouth open for a minute, utterly perplexed at how completely screwed up everything had become, then stood, got dressed as quickly as he could, and headed for the door. He needed to find Jemaine. They were going to work this out now.

\---------------------------------------

It turned out that Bret didn't have to look far. He exited the apartment as quickly as he could, and as he was fumbling with his keys to lock the door behind him, he heard a soft sniffling sound coming from a little ways away. 

Jemaine was sitting with his back against the wall, a few feet from their door. His face was hidden in his arms which were wrapped tightly around his knees. 

Any residual annoyance that Bret may have felt melted away the instant he saw Jemaine, and he quietly went over to sit beside him.

"I thought you were leaving," Bret said.

"Couldn't find my shoes," Jemaine replied, not lifting his head, his voice muffled and miserable.

"So were you planning to stay out here all night?" Bret asked.

"Leave me alone, Bret," Jemaine mumbled.

"No," Bret said, firmly, "come on, let's go back inside."

"Why?" Jemaine asked, "so you can break up with me?"

"I'm not going to...what makes you think I'm going to break up with you?" Bret asked.

"Because I'm an idiot," Jemaine answered, "and I made you feel used like those bastard girls did...and because you said this is never going to work."

"I said this was never going to work if we don't communicate," Bret clarified, prying one of Jemaine's hands from around his knees and holding it tightly. "Besides, how can I break up with you if we haven't even decided we're in a relationship?"

"Aren't we?" Jemaine asked, finally lifting his head to look at Bret, eyes red but dry.

"I thought we were," Bret said, "but every time I try to talk to you about it you don't want to."

"Sorry," Jemaine said, "I just get scared that if we talk about stuff...you'll realize you're better off without me...and...and then you'll leave..."

"Jemaine," Bret explained, as gently as he could, "how long have we been friends now? How long have we been living together? I know you better than anybody. I haven't ever thought I'd be better off without you. And I definitely don't want to leave you."

"Really?" Jemaine asked.

"Yes, really," Bret assured him, "but you have to stop changing the subject or running away every time things get serious, OK?"

"OK," Jemaine agreed, "I'm sorry, you know how terrible I am at making relationships work."

"I know," Bret said, "but I'm pretty terrible too, so we'll just have to learn as we go, I guess."

Jemaine just nodded.

"And I'm sorry I freaked out," Bret added, "the candles and stuff were really nice. I know you were just trying to be romantic."

"S'OK," Jemaine assured him. 

"And I'm sorry if I...indirectly...called you a slut," Bret said, smiling a little, "I swear I didn't mean it that way."

"It's OK," Jemaine said, "I suppose I kind of am. For you anyway."

They sat for a moment, still holding hands, neither sure what to say next.

"We still have more to talk about," Bret said with a sigh, "but I think it can wait until morning. It's getting really late and we should probably just go to sleep."

"Yeah, alright," Jemaine agreed, letting Bret help him up, then following him back into the apartment. 

They blew out the remaining candles and got changed into their pyjamas. Bret got into his bed but Jemaine just stood there for a moment, not sure if Bret might prefer that Jemaine sleep in his own bed tonight.

"Jemaine, are you getting in or what?" Bret asked, lifting up the covers on his bed.

Jemaine made his way over to the bed and folded himself gratefully into Bret's arms, his head resting on Bret's chest. Bret rubbed Jemaine's back gently with one hand and stroked his hair with the other. Jemaine had never felt more safe or loved in his entire life, so it came as a bit of a surprise to him when he found himself beginning to cry again.

"What's wrong, Jemaine?" Bret asked, feeling wetness soaking through his shirt.

"I dunno," Jemaine answered, "I guess...I'm just worried."

"Worried about what?" Bret asked, brushing a tear from Jemaine's cheek.

"Worried I'm going to do something to screw this up," Jemaine replied, quietly, "it just seems like this is too good to be true, you know? Things like this don't happen to me. And if they do I always find a way to ruin it. I just...I just can't ruin this. I don't know what I'd do without you, Bret. I love you way too much to handle losing you."

"You're not going to lose me, Jemaine," Bret assured him, "whatever happens, we'll figure it out together, OK? I promise. I love you too."

And, though he was relieved, Jemaine continued to cry, unable to stop himself now that he had finally opened up and told Bret what had been bothering him. Now that he had finally told Bret he loved him and Bret had said it back. 

"S'OK, Jemaine," Bret soothed, shifting until they were facing each other and he was holding Jemaine as tightly as he could, "it's OK...I've got you."

Jemaine sobbed quietly into Bret's shoulder, feeling as though all of the stress and worry he had kept bottled up over the past few months was pouring out of him. Bret rubbed his back in soothing circles and, when Jemaine's sobs subsided, Bret began kissing the tears from his face.

Jemaine brought his lips, trembling and wet, to Bret's and kissed him as if his life depended on it. Bret kissed him back and tenderly stroked his hair. 

After awhile, Jemaine fell asleep with Bret's arms still around him, exhausted beyond belief but finally believing they might just be able to make this work after all.

\------------

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was originally intended to have 6 chapters (or 5 plus an epilogue) but life happened and I never ended up writing the last chapter. As this fic was written 4 years ago I'm no longer in the headspace to write a satisfying ending. However I can summarize the intended ending thusly: Bret and Jemaine have lots of awesome sex and live happily ever after ;-)


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